Jan Ford's World

I'm staying at the Waldorf Astoria in Park Lane. This is another of the famous Art Deco style hotels which I tend to look at. The publi...

We board via gate 10 but instead of the usual airbridge, we walk down a long ramp and stairs to travel on a fleet of buses to an outside st...

Greetings from Heathrow Terminal 4! A new adventure starts! Well, I've got as far as the British Airways Lounge, having checked in on t...

In the 1960s, we'd been designing digital selective call equipment for use in Private Mobile Radio equipment. Our client, Gerry Gardner,...

The 'Lion' supporters group, the Old Locomotive Committee (or, more simply, OLCO), holds a competition for live-steam models of ...

Larger version of diagram Deepfields was one of the Stour Valley signal boxes I worked unofficially in the 1960s. Bloomfield Junction ...

Larger version of diagram Bloomfield Junction is another of the boxes I worked regularly under supervision in the 1960s. It was on the S...

Larger version of diagram In the late 1950s, I was a frequent vistor at Watery Lane signal box on the Stour Valley Line from Birmingham t...

When I was establishing my firm, some of my friends had jobs where they always seemed to be jetting off around the world and, I admit, I wa...

The 'Lion' supporters group, the Old Locomotive Committee (or, more simply, OLCO), holds a competition for live-steam models of ...

Click here for a larger version of the diagram Back in the 1960s, Dudleyport was the largest of the boxes on the Stour Valley that I got...

Back in 1975, G.E.C. (the English General Electric Company, not to be confused with the separate American business, General Electric or G.E...

In the early 1970s, British Rail was modernising and electrifying the West Coast Main Line from Crewe to Carlisle. Just three Power Signal ...

When I was much younger, I studied railway signalling and, through the kindness of a number of signalmen, I became a regular visitor at v...

Lisa and Jan on the footplate of 'Royal Pioneer' at Peak Rail on 14th January 2007 (photograph by John Archer). I was driver at...

This post is based on a talk given by Jan Ford at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. In the eighteen twenties, Manchester ...

These notes were written some years ago when I was a regular driver at Birmingham Railway Museum. I believe I was the last person to have t...

When I was young, it was a real thrill to visit Birmingham Science Museum, then situated in cramped quarters in Newhall Street. Every inch ...

My first visit to India was a business trip in 1992. Ford Electronics had supplied telecommunications equipment to G.E.C. for the Delhi Ri...

Jan working on the mural described below During my earlier business trips to Thailand, I'd met Sanpasiri Viriyasiri who was involve...