Images of the Great Eastern Railway Steam Laundry - 1912

These pictures from the Great Eastern Railway Magazine of March 1912 show the Great Eastern Railway's steam laundry at the Colchester. It was built in 1888 to serve the companies' hotels, but by 1912 it was also cleaning the laundry of refreshment rooms, steamships and the guard's and enginemen's dormitories. Since 1893 it had been under the charge of Mr John Bell, and in 1912 was employing fifty-nine girls and twelve men. Over the years the number of items it washed increased as the GER's business expanded; from 949,030 in 1890, to 3,473,121 in 1911.

The First Pages of Railway Company Staff Magazines

I thought I'd just share some of the first pages of railway company staff magazines before World War One. The first shown is the original railway company staff magazine, the London and South Western Railway's South Western Gazette from June 1881. This is followed by The Great Western Railway Magazine and Temperance Union Recorder from November 1888. After this is The Great Central Railway Journal, from July 1905, and lastly is The Great Eastern Railway Magazine, published in January 1911. Unfortunately, I don't have an image of the final railway company staff magazine established before 1914, The London and North Western Railway Gazette, which began in 1912 (I think)

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