Month: December 2024

A famous model with cast iron provenance, the North Eastern Railway Tennant 2-4-0 no. 1477, was expertly scratch built and painted (circa late 1950’s) by no less than the pioneer of O gauge finescale modelling, the great Bernard Miller. With hand painted lettering and numerals in the fully lined NER passenger green livery. Built with very fine quality cast wheels and a John Hart RM (short) type motor no. 862. She collects power from the tender wheels and from plunger pick-ups on the loco. A belt and braces job and there is nothing wrong with that. This model was built for the famous layout of Stanley Norris and featured in the Model Railway News magazine of February 1960. Also featured in the Railway Modeller magazine of January 1971 when on a visit to Wally Mayhew’s Stanley to Stratford St. Andrew layout.

On Bernard’s passing in 1980 she was obtained by Arthur Dewar and is shown on Arthur’s layout in Jack Ray’s book ‘Model Railways and their builders’ published by Atlantic Press. She also featured in the Gauge O Guild Gazette on Arthur’s layout (see page 338 of the link at the bottom of this page). On Arthur’s death she passed onto Wally West and as part of his collection she has now found her way into my collection.

When obtained, her paintwork had deteriorated with age, the black paint on the outside frames in particular had become unstable and had worn away completely in places. Fortunately, most of the green areas have survived well. I have now had Bernard’s paint restored by the museum conservator John Cockcroft, who has managed to preserve the hand painted numbers and lettering. I must say that he has made a superb job of it. A powerful loco, I have had her pulling eight coaches with ease. A good load for a 2-4-0.

https://www.gaugeoguild.com/secured/gazette_archive/Vol11-10//offline/download.pdf