All Our Yesterdays - 20th December 1909

A hundred years ago today on the 20th December 1909 Herny Fowler succeeded Richard Deeley as the Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Midland Railway (MR). He later became Chief Mechanical Engineer of the London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) in 1925. Although he designed some excellant engines (ie LMS 4P, 2-6-4T's) he is remembered for as being responsible for the adoption by the LMS of the MR small engine policy. Under Fowler various MR types were built by the LMS, including the 4P Compound 4-4-0, the 2P 4-4-0, the 4F 0-6-0, and the 3F 0-6-0T. The small engine policy resulted in frequent double-heading, as the locomotives were not powerful enough to cope with loads, and thus increased expense. These standard locomotives were also built with short-travel valves and small axle boxes as he failed to balance the advances in technology with standardisation, the former leading to inefficiency and the latter to frequent hot axle boxes. Sir Henry Fowler retired in 1933, William Stanier was head-hunted into the job from the Great Western Railway and it was he who transformed LMS locomotive policy.
http://pics-by-john.photoblog.org.uk/c1794012.html