Madder Valley
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Pendon Museum, located in
Long Wittenham Long Wittenham is a village and small Civil parishes in England, civil parish about north of Didcot, and southeast of Abingdon, Oxfordshire, Abingdon. It was part of Berkshire until the Local Government Act 1972, 1974 boundary changes transfe ...
near
Didcot Didcot ( ) is a railway town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in South Oxfordshire, England, located south of Oxford, east of Wantage and north west of Reading, Berkshire, Reading. Historically part of Berkshire, the town is noted ...
,
Oxfordshire Oxfordshire ( ; abbreviated ''Oxon'') is a ceremonial county in South East England. The county is bordered by Northamptonshire and Warwickshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the east, Berkshire to the south, and Wiltshire and Glouceste ...
,
England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
, is a museum that displays
scale models Scale or scales may refer to: Mathematics * Scale (descriptive set theory), an object defined on a set of points * Scale (ratio), the ratio of a linear dimension of a model to the corresponding dimension of the original * Scale factor, a number ...
, in particular a large scene representing parts of the
Vale of White Horse The Vale of White Horse is a Non-metropolitan district, local government district of Oxfordshire in England. It Historic counties of England, was historically part of Berkshire. The area is commonly referred to as the 'Vale of ''the'' White Hors ...
in the 1920s and 1930s. The scene, under construction since the 1950s and with parts dating back earlier, was inspired by detailed research into the architecture and landscape of the vale, with some models of cottages taking hundreds of hours to complete. The late Roye England, an anglophile Australian who lived in England, founded it, and ran it jointly with the late English Model Maker, Guy Williams, who made fifty-seven of the museum's ninety locomotives. They can be seen working together in the 1958
British Pathé British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and cultur ...
short, 'Hair Thatching'. A group of volunteers runs the museum and it is open to the public most weekends and holidays, except during the winter. and Wednesdays during school holidays.


History

The museum was founded by the artist and craftsman Roye England, who was interested in
model railways Railway modelling (UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Ireland) or model railroading (US and Canada) is a hobby in which rail transport systems are Model building, modelled at a reduced Scale (ratio), scale. The scale models include locomotives ...
. He observed the destruction and modification of many historic buildings in the area and began to make model representations of them. Both the main Vale scene and others display working scale model railway scale models of typical scenes on the
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...
(GWR) of the 1920s. The trains are also representative in detail of those travelling that line in those years.


Displays


Vale of White Horse

The main display and ongoing project at Pendon is a scale representation of the
Vale of White Horse The Vale of White Horse is a Non-metropolitan district, local government district of Oxfordshire in England. It Historic counties of England, was historically part of Berkshire. The area is commonly referred to as the 'Vale of ''the'' White Hors ...
as it was in the inter-war period. The scene is centred on the 'typical' village of Pendon Parva, which is served by a railway station on the main London to Bristol GWR main line that runs through the Vale, and another on the M&SWJR that became one of the constituent companies of the GWR in 1923. The topography and the village layout is fictional, but every building and significant feature is an exact model of a real building from the Vale of White Horse. Some locos on the layout: *
GWR 2900 Class The Great Western Railway 2900 Class or ''Saint'' Class was built by the Great Western Railway's Swindon Works. The class incorporated several series of 2-cylinder steam locomotives designed by George Jackson Churchward and built between 1902 an ...
No. 2943 Hampton Court Built in 1912. *
GWR 4000 Class The Great Western Railway 4000 or Star were a class of 4-cylinder 4-6-0 passenger steam locomotives designed by George Jackson Churchward for the Great Western Railway (GWR) in 1906 and introduced from early 1907. The prototype was built as a 4 ...
No. 4050 Princess Alice Built in 1914. *
GWR 2251 Class The Great Western Railway (GWR) 2251 Class or Collett Goods Class was a class of 0-6-0 steam tender locomotives designed for medium-powered freight. They were introduced in 1930 as a replacement for the earlier Dean Goods 0-6-0s and were built ...
No. 2253 Built in 1930. * LSWR N15 Class No. 789 Sir Guy Built in 1925. *
GWR 3700 Class The Great Western Railway 3700 Class, or City Class, was a series of twenty 4-4-0 steam locomotives, designed for hauling express passenger trains. Construction In September 1902 a member of the Atbara Class, no. 3405 ''Mauritius'', was rebo ...
No. 3705 Mauritius *
LSWR S15 class The LSWR S15 class is a British 2-Cylinder (locomotive), cylinder 4-6-0 freight steam locomotive designed by Robert W. Urie, based on his LSWR H15 class, H15 class and LSWR N15 class, N15 class locomotives. The class had a complex build history ...
No. 515 Built in 1921.


Dartmoor branch

On the ground floor of the museum, a model representing a Great Western Railway branch line on
Dartmoor Dartmoor is an upland area in southern Devon, South West England. The moorland and surrounding land has been protected by National Park status since 1951. Dartmoor National Park covers . The granite that forms the uplands dates from the Carb ...
, originally built in 1955 to showcase the trains being built for the Vale scene, is operated for visitors. The main focus of the Dartmoor scene is a model of
Brunel Isambard Kingdom Brunel ( ; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was an English civil engineer and mechanical engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history", "one of the 19th-century engi ...
's timber viaduct at Walkham in Devon built by R. Guy Williams, who also built many of the model locomotives at the museum. Locos on the layout include: *
GWR 2900 Class The Great Western Railway 2900 Class or ''Saint'' Class was built by the Great Western Railway's Swindon Works. The class incorporated several series of 2-cylinder steam locomotives designed by George Jackson Churchward and built between 1902 an ...
No. 2921 Saint Dunstan Built in 1907. *
GWR 2800 Class The Great Western Railway (GWR) 2800 Class is a class of steam locomotive designed in 1903 by George Jackson Churchward. Members of the class have a 2-8-0 wheel arrangement and were produced from 1905 to 1919 for heavy freight work, but member ...
No. 2844 Built in 1912. * LSWR M7 Class No. 30 Built in 1904


Madder Valley

The museum includes displays of individual models, modelling methods and railway artefacts. It also displays ''Madder Valley'', a pioneering model railway built by John Ahern.


Models

The model trains are hand built, to represent individual
locomotive A locomotive is a rail transport, rail vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. Traditionally, locomotives pulled trains from the front. However, Push–pull train, push–pull operation has become common, and in the pursuit for ...
s,
carriages A carriage is a two- or four-wheeled horse-drawn vehicle for passengers. In Europe they were a common mode of transport for the wealthy during the Roman Empire, and then again from around 1600 until they were replaced by the motor car around 1 ...
, and
wagons A wagon (or waggon) is a heavy four-wheeled vehicle pulled by draft animals or on occasion by humans, used for transporting goods, commodities, agricultural materials, supplies and sometimes people. Wagons are immediately distinguished from ...
as exactly possible, based on surviving records and photographs. Operation consists of a sequence of trains, showing what one could have seen passing by on a summer day and night, in the mid-1920s. This sequence is based on timetables of the period. They are all modelled in 4 mm to 1 foot scale (1:76), and run on track of 18mm gauge, a combination known as
EM gauge EM gauge (named after the track gauge of a nominal Eighteen Millimetres) is a variant of 4 mm to a foot (1:76) scale used in model railways. EM was developed because OO gauge, favoured by manufacturers of British prototype models, utilised track ...
.


References


External links


Official website
{{authority control Museums with year of establishment missing Museums in Oxfordshire Railway museums in England Model railroads Scale modeling