THOMAS BRASSEY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 October 1940, Page 6

THOMAS BRASSEY

0 — WROTE HIS NAME IN IRON. He wrote his name in iron. He was Thomas Brassey, born in Trafalgar year. He died in 1870. Descendant of the Brasseys who for 600 years held lands in Cheshire, he was a friend of George Stephenson whom he met when he was 29. Through Stephenson lie obtained the contract for building the Penkridge Viaduct on the Grand Junction line. He went on to undertake huge contracts in railway construction. He possessed the highest business talent with skill in organisation, and having carried to a successful issue great railway works in France, fulfilling his contract to time in spite of opposition and immense difficulty, he became responsible for large-scale works all over the world.

For four years he employed five thousand men on the Great Northern railway, never once failing to finish a niece of work to time. He was beloved fortunes of many younger men. Indifferent to honours and money, he made a fortune without trying to do so. He gave Italy her first great railway line. For seven years he was busy in Canada, constructing the wonderful Grand Trunk Railway, an undertaking full of problems and dangers. In 1854. with two other engineers, he built the Crimean railway in the face of oppo-

sition: and he undertook the building of some of .Australia's first miles of permanent way. The Argentine railways and the notable Moldavian railways in India were among his gigantic schemes. In the end. anxiety over his last undertaking—the Fell Railway over Mount Cenis —brought on a stroke: and he died with his mind full of railways. He lies at Catsfield in Sussex, the amazing railwayman.