Press Office

Search Engine

Search Engine is now the most comprehensive railway library in the UK with an amazing 1.5 million photographs in the archive dating from the 1850’s to the present day. That’s an average of 9554 photos from every year since 1850! But the archive is not only about photographs - over one million engineering drawings of railway vehicles are also available for viewing in the archive, dating as far back as 1820!

These archive collections are not light by any means, in total the archive weighs 180 tonnes, an incredible 22 tonnes heavier than Flying Scotsman! One reason we at the NRM are keen to display ‘the real thing’ rather than a digital copy is because if the archive were to be scanned, scanning one item every 10 minutes, it would take a mind blowing 240 working years to digitise the engineering drawings and photographic archives alone!

Search Engine will house a great range of items when fully complete, with a selection of National Collection ‘treasures’ on display for all to see. These currently include items such as the following:

  • The John Backhouse Letter - a significant piece of the National Collection. Written by a 14 year old County Durham boy, it is the only eye witness account of the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825 and is also thought to be the world’s oldest child’s drawing of a train.
  • A note book compiled by railway engineers from Sir Daniel Gooch, which shows incredibly detailed hand drawings of locomotives on pages no bigger than a post card!
  • One of only a few diaries in existence of Robert Stephenson.
  • One of the earliest railway timetables dating back to 1839.
  • Records and recording equipment from Oscar-winning sound recordist Peter Handford! This includes a hand built recording desk that was powered by a car battery allowing him to record his famous ‘train sounds’.
  • Drawings and letters from the railway’s pre-passenger era when locomotives were only used for transport in coal mines and other heavy industrial processes.
  • An 1877 letter and sketch by Prince Edward (Prince of Wales) outlining his requirements for his future royal carriage.
  • A stunning portrait of a railway collecting dog and his owner! These were a common sight on many large railway stations platforms, collecting money for worthy causes.
  • An amazing display of paintings, illustrating everything from trains to boats!

Search Engine has been made possible by a number of funders, who have helped raise the £4 million needed to build the new state-of-the-art archive and research centre. The key funders are:

  • Heritage Lottery Fund
  • Higher Education Funding Council for England
  • Department of Culture Media and Sport
  • The University of York