Railway periodica 1970s?

[duesselmartin]

Hello All,

what rail related magazines were availabe in the UK in the 1970s?
I'd be interested in aquireing some to study the developement of BR in that time.

Best wishes from Germany.

Martin

 

[Gloster]

I think the main ones were Modern Railways, Railway Magazine and Railway World. There were others, but I am not sure if many, or any, were published over a long period or had a wide remit.

You might be better obtaining books, although you would need to choose carefully to obtain a book covering your area of interest, rather than one of the endless list of books of photos of locos. (Unless that is your interest.)

 

[etr221]

I would recommend Modern Railways as the one to look for - it was semi-professional (advertised itself as the one the professionals read). Railway World aimed more at the heritage side of things. Railway Magazine has always aimed at being the 'standard' magazine for the enthusiast to read, but at that period was going through phase of being low standard - had a lot of articles which seemed to say not much more than 'I saw a train and it was blue' (It used to be, and now is, much better: but that was a time when I bought it just to have a complete run...). The real professional mag was Railway Gazette, but that wasn't on general sale.

 

[satisnek]

I too would recommend Modern Railways - every issue provides a snapshot of the UK railway scene with a level of detail which no book could ever achieve. However, 1970s editions may be quite hard to find - I think that the circulation was fairly low back then, so there won't be many around today.

 

[midland1]

There are some on ebay oddly there seems to be a lot more from the 1960s.

 

[Gloster]

There are some on ebay oddly there seems to be a lot more from the 1960s.

Presumably because while steam was still about they would buy anything and everything to find where to chase it. After that, “Diesels, Pah...”

 

[Western Sunset]

The quality of the binding of Modern Railways was poor in late 60s/ early 70s, with the magazine falling apart quite easily.

 

[30907]

A random source might just be
http://www.vintagecarriagestrust.org/magazines.htm
They have received large quantities of stuff this year from two significant sources, so might be worth asking.
Of the magazines, Modern Railways was most likely to be read within the industry, Railway Magazine a good all-rounder (I didn't read Railway World but it was definitely complementary to MR.

 

[duesselmartin]

Thank you all for your input.

 

[Forty29]

I used to have a lot of early 70's Modern Railways stored at my dad's house. When I cleared his house out when he went into a home l moved them to my shed which l didn't realise had sprung a leak so a lot got ruined. I still have a few mint condition ones that survive. I remember my dad bringing them up to me on a Saturday morning with my Cor comic! I think he used to look at it before me. Was only about 30p!!