FEATURES OF ENGINEERING INTEREST 8i 



given locality, and it is with the object of giving such training that the 

 Railway Signalling School has been formed. The school is also used 

 for the lectures on Block Rules and Regulations hitherto held in the old 

 classroom on Toft Green. 



The objects of the school are therefore : 



1 . (Technical) To give to the staff dealing with the construction and 

 maintenance of signal, telegraph and telephone installations instructions in 

 the principles of electrical and mechanical signalling and of telegraphy and 

 telephony. 



2. (Operating) To enable the students attending the lectures on block 

 rules and regulations and general rules to become conversant with the 

 operating side of signalling. 



With the above objects in view, the school has been equipped with a 

 model railway layout incorporating five signal boxes designed to show 

 every possible use that can be made of track circuiting. There are also 

 full-size working models of various apparatus met with in signalling and 

 telegraph installations. 



To describe within the limits of the present article the system of working 

 and of instruction would be impossible, but a short explanatory demon- 

 stration will be given at the School. 



The Railway Museum, York. 



The Railway Museum is in two sections, viz. : 



(i) The small exhibits section, consisting of three main rooms and an 

 ante-room, in which are preserved the smaller and more perishable 

 relics, including prints, photographs, books and time-tables. 



(2) A large building, formerly a locomotive fitting shop, in which are 

 preserved the more bulky exhibits, including historic engines, 

 early railway carriages, the world's first iron railway bridge, and much 

 early signalling apparatus ; also what is probably the finest collection 

 in existence of early rails and obsolete permanent-way equipment. 



In the Small Exhibits Section are preserved the original survey and 

 plan of the Stockton and Darlington Railway prepared by George 

 Stephenson, tools used by him in building his early locomotives, and a 

 number of Stephenson letters. In this section are also preserved a 

 number of petitions on parchment containing many hundreds of signatures 

 of inhabitants of the North of England, praying that the houses of Parlia- 

 ment should pass the Bill for the Stockton and Darlington Railway. 

 Here are also to be seen a large number of prints, prospectuses, booklets, 

 time-tables, railway tickets, signalling apparatus, seals and small relics 

 relating to the numerous railways promoted in the North of England 

 during the early part of the nineteenth century. 



A room is devoted to the Briggs Collection, bequeathed by Mr. Isaac 

 Briggs of Wakefield, consisting of prints and books relating to the civil 

 engineering side of railway development. 



In the Large Exhibits Section are preserved an engine (partly rebuilt) 

 constructed by George Stephenson in 1822 for the Hetton Colliery 



