A headboard is a board hung on the front of a locomotive. Generally it can depict a named train. Headboards are distinct from locomotive nameplates. In the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, headboards were common on the public railway in the age of steam and into the age of Diesel and

electric Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by ...

trains, although in modern times, use of headboards on scheduled trains is now defunct, although headboards are often still used on the occasion of a "last train", such as the withdrawal of a particular class of locomotive. On the scheduled network, headboards were used to denote special named trains, such as luxury pullmans, blue riband

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or other once a day special services such as

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s. Latterly, headboards are still used by

railtour A railtour is a special train which is run in order to allow people to experience rail travel which is not normally available using timetabled passenger services. The 'unusual' aspect may be the route of the train, the destination, the occasion, ...

companies for rail enthusiast's excursions, to denote the name of a tour, or more generally the name of the organisation running a tour. Headboards are also frequently used on heritage railway line services to denote special trains or events. Common practice in the UK is to display the headboard on the front of a locomotive (temporarily attached, to denote the name of the train or other purpose), and to have the nameplate of the locomotive on the side of the locomotive (permanently attached to denote the name of the locomotive). Confusion may have arisen over the example of the "Flying Scotsman" — where ''The Flying Scotsman'' is a famous named train service operating since 1862, after which a now famous locomotive, the 1923 built No. 4472 ''Flying Scotsman'' was named — while the ''Flying Scotsman'' headboard has been worn by many different locomotives over the years, when No. 4472 was running the service for which it was built, this would give rise to No. 4472 displaying the name ''Flying Scotsman'' on both the front and the side of the locomotive.

See also

Further reading