Editing L. T. C. Rolt

{{Short description|English historian and biographer}}
{{Redirect|Tom Rolt|the locomotive of the same name|Tom Rolt (locomotive)|the British official of the East India Company, President of Surat and Governor of Bombay from 1677 to 1681|Thomas Rolt}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2022}}
{{Use British English|date=May 2013}}
{{infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] -->
| name          = Tom Rolt
| image         =
| imagesize     =
| alt           =
| caption       =
| pseudonym     =
| birth_name     = Lionel Thomas Caswall Rolt
| birth_date     = {{Birth date|df=y|1910|2|11}}
| birth_place    = [[Chester]], England
| death_date     = {{Death date and age|df=y|1974|05|09|1910|02|11}}
| death_place    =
| resting_place = [[Stanley Pontlarge]]
| occupation    = {{flatlist|
* Engineer
* technical assistant
* writer
}}
| nationality   = British
| ethnicity     =
| citizenship   =
| education     = [[Cheltenham College]]
| alma_mater    =
| period        = 1944–1974
| genre         = Industrial history, Biography, Ghost stories
| subject       = Railways, waterways, industrial history
| movement      =
| notableworks  = [[Narrow Boat (book)|Narrow Boat]], Winterstoke (1954), Railway Adventure, Red for Danger, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Thomas Telford, George and Robert Stephenson, The Landscape Trilogy (autobiography)
| spouse        = Angela Orred (1939–1951)<br /> [[Sonia Rolt|Sonia Smith]] (1952–1974)
| partner(s)    =
| children      = Richard (1953), Timothy (1955)
| relatives     = Lionel Rolt (father)
| influences    =  
| influenced    =
| awards        = Hon MA [[Newcastle University]], Hon MSc [[University of Bath]]
| website       = {{url|www.ltcrolt.org.uk}}
| portaldisp    =
}}
'''Lionel Thomas Caswall Rolt''' (usually abbreviated to '''Tom Rolt''' or '''L. T. C. Rolt''') (11 February 1910 – 9 May 1974<ref>His death was recorded in ''The Times'' No 59086, 11 May 1974</ref><ref name=RM197407>{{cite journal |editor1-first=J.N. |editor1-last=Slater |date=July 1974 |title=Notes and News: Death of L. T. C. Rolt |journal=[[The Railway Magazine|Railway Magazine]] |volume=120 |issue=879 |publisher=IPC Transport Press Ltd |location=London |issn=0033-8923 |page=364 }}</ref>) was a prolific English writer and the biographer of major [[civil engineering]] figures, including [[Isambard Kingdom Brunel]] and [[Thomas Telford]]. He is also regarded as one of the pioneers of the leisure cruising industry on Britain's inland waterways, and was an enthusiast for [[vintage car]]s and [[heritage railway]]s. He played a pioneering role in both the canal and railway preservation movements.

==Biography==
=== Early life ===
Tom Rolt was born in [[Chester]] to a line of Rolts "dedicated to hunting and procreation". His father Lionel had settled back in Britain in [[Hay-on-Wye]] after working on a cattle station in Australia and a plantation in India, and joining (unsuccessfully) in the [[Klondike Gold Rush]] of 1898. However, Lionel Rolt lost most of his money in 1920 after investing his capital in a company that failed, and the family moved to a pair of stone cottages in [[Stanley Pontlarge]] in Gloucestershire.<ref>{{cite book|author=Ian Mackersey|title=Tom Rolt and the Cressy Years|author-link=Ian Mackersey|publisher=London: M & M Baldwin|year=1985}}</ref>

Rolt studied at [[Cheltenham College]] and at the age of 16 he took a job learning about steam traction, before starting an apprenticeship at the [[Kerr Stuart]] locomotive works in [[Stoke-on-Trent]], where his uncle, [[Kyrle Willans]], was chief development engineer. His uncle bought a wooden horse-drawn narrow [[flyboat]] called ''Cressy'' and fitted it with a steam engine. Then, having discovered that the steam made steering through tunnels impossible, he replaced the engine with a [[Ford Model T]] engine. This was Rolt's introduction to the canal system.

=== Cars ===
After Kerr Stuart went into liquidation in 1930, Rolt became jobless and turned to vintage sports cars, taking part in the [[London to Brighton Veteran Car Run|veteran run to Brighton]], and acquiring a succession of cars including a 1924 [[Alvis 12/50]] two seater "duck's back" that he kept for the rest of his life.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nrm.org.uk/AboutUs/PressOffice/PressReleases/2010/February/vehicleevents.aspx|title=Vehicles of all descriptions welcome|publisher=National Railway Museum|access-date=2010-06-24|archive-date=8 March 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100308212227/http://www.nrm.org.uk/AboutUs/PressOffice/PressReleases/2010/February/vehicleevents.aspx|url-status=dead}} It is now in the National Railway Museum at Shildon</ref>

Rolt bought into a motor garage partnership next to the Phoenix public house in [[Hartley Wintney]] in Hampshire. Its breakdown vehicle was an adapted 1911 [[Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost]]. Together with the landlord of the Phoenix, Tim Carson, and others, Rolt formed the [[Vintage Sports-Car Club]] in 1934. He also founded the [[Prescott Speed Hill Climb|Prescott hill climb]]. His 1950 book ''Horseless Carriage'' contains a diatribe against the emergence of [[mass production]] in the English car industry, claiming that "mass production methods must develop towards the ultimate end [of automatic procreation of machines by machines], although by doing so, they involve either the supersession of men by machines or a continual expansion of production".<ref>{{cite book|last=Rolt|first=L T C|title=Horseless Carriage|year=1950|publisher=Constable|location=London|pages=120}}</ref> His preference for traditional craftsmanship helps to explain his subsequent career.

=== Cressy ===
In 1936 Kyrle Willans bought back ''Cressy'', which he had earlier sold, and several trips on the waterways convinced Rolt that he wanted a life afloat. He persuaded Angela Orred to join him in this idyll. She was a young blonde in a white polonecked sweater who had swept into his garage in an Alfa Romeo in 1937 and been caught up in the vintage car scene. Rolt bought ''Cressy'' from his uncle and set about converting her into a boat that could be lived on, the most notable addition being a bath.

[[File:Plaque commemorating LTC Rolt - geograph.org.uk - 678374.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Chester memorial plaque]]
During the summer of 1939 Rolt and Angela decided to defy her father's objections and married in secret on 11 July. Work on ''Cressy'' was completed at [[Tooley's Boatyard]] in [[Banbury]], and on 27 July Rolt and his wife set off up the [[Oxford Canal]].

=== War ===
The outbreak of the [[Second World War]] intervened and Rolt, a pacifist at heart, immediately signed up at the Rolls-Royce factory at [[Crewe]] to work on the production line of the [[Supermarine Spitfire (early Merlin powered variants)|Spitfire]]'s [[Rolls-Royce Merlin|Merlin]] engine. He was saved from the tedium of the production line by the offer of a job in a bell foundry at [[Aldbourne#Bell foundry|Aldbourne]] in Wiltshire. The Rolts headed south in ''Cressy'' through storms, reaching Banbury a day before the canals were frozen over for the winter. 

In March 1940 the Rolts negotiated the [[River Thames]] in flood and headed up the [[River Kennet]] to reach [[Hungerford]], near Aldbourne. Rolt then worked there for more than a year.

The Rolts' first four-month cruise was described in a book that Rolt initially called ''Painted Ship''. He sent the manuscript to several publishers, but it did not find acceptance, as it was felt that there was no market for books about canals. It was not until after a magazine article he wrote came to the attention of the countryside writer [[H. J. Massingham]] that Rolt's book was published, in December 1944, under the title ''[[Narrow Boat (book)|Narrow Boat]]''.

=== Inland Waterways Association ===
''Narrow Boat'' had an immediate success with critics and public, leading to fan mail arriving at the Rolts' boat, which was then moored at [[Tardebigge]]. Two of the letters were from [[Robert Aickman]] and [[Charles Hadfield (historian)|Charles Hadfield]], who were both to figure prominently in the next phase of Rolt's life, when he became a campaigner. He invited Aickman and his wife Ray to join the Rolts on ''Cressy''. Aickman later described the journey with the Rolts as "the best time I have ever spent on the waterways". It was on this journey that they decided to form an organisation that a few weeks later, in May 1946, at Aickman's flat in London, was named the [[Inland Waterways Association]], with Aickman as chairman, Hadfield as vice-chairman and Rolt as secretary.

The inland waterways of Britain were nationalised in 1947 and faced an uncertain future. The traditional life that Rolt had described seemed to be threatened with extinction. Rolt pioneered direct action on the [[Stratford-upon-Avon Canal]], which stopped [[British Waterways]] from closing it; organised a hugely successful Inland Waterways Exhibition, which started in London but toured the country; and proposed the first boat rally at [[Market Harborough]]. Aickman, who had a private income, was working full time on the campaign, while Rolt, who had only his writing to support him and was still living aboard ''Cressy'', struggled to meet all his commitments. Eventually he fell out with Aickman over the latter's insistence that every mile of canal should be saved. In early 1951 Rolt was expelled from the organisation he had inspired.

By this time he had decided to bring his life on ''Cressy'' to an end and return to his family home in Stanley Pontlarge. Angela departed to continue the mobile life, joining [[Billy Smart, Jr.|Billy Smart]]'s Circus.

=== Talyllyn Railway ===
A letter Rolt had sent to the ''[[Birmingham Post]]'' in 1950 resulted in the formation of the [[Talyllyn Railway Preservation Society]], and he now threw himself into its activities, becoming chairman of the company that operated the railway as a tourist attraction. "By the time the fateful letter terminating his IWA membership arrived, he was already busy issuing and stamping passengers' tickets from the little station in [[Tywyn|Towyn]]".<ref>{{cite book|title=Race Against Time|author=David Bolton|publisher=Methuen|year=1990|page=93}}</ref> His time at Talyllyn gave rise to his book ''Railway Adventure'' (1953), which became the basis for the [[Ealing comedy]] film ''[[The Titfield Thunderbolt]]''.

Rolt married again, to [[Sonia Rolt|Sonia Smith]] (''née'' South), a former actress. During the war she had become one of the amateur boatwomen who worked the canals and had married a boatman. She had been on the council of the IWA. They had two sons, Tim and Dick, and continued to live in Stanley Pontlarge until Rolt's death in 1974.

=== Author ===
Rolt became a full-time writer in 1939.<ref>{{cite web |title=L.T.C. Rolt Collection |url=https://www.bath.ac.uk/corporate-information/l-t-c-rolt-collection/ |website=University of Bath}}</ref> The 1950s were Rolt's most prolific time as an author. His best-known works were biographies of [[Isambard Kingdom Brunel]], which stimulated a revival of interest in a forgotten hero,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bbchistorymagazine.com/feature/local-heroes|title=Local Heroes|publisher=BBC History Magazine|access-date=2010-06-24}}</ref><ref>In 1958, Rolt gave the first Brunel lecture in the newly renamed Brunel College of Technology, later to become [[Brunel University]] {{cite web|url=http://www.brunel.ac.uk/409/History_Docs/lecture.pdf|title=The First Brunel Lecture|access-date=2011-01-12|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120615052147/http://www.brunel.ac.uk/409/History_Docs/lecture.pdf|archive-date=15 June 2012}}</ref> [[George Stephenson|George]] and [[Robert Stephenson]], and [[Thomas Telford]]. His classic study of historic railway accidents, ''Red for Danger'', became a textbook for numerous engineering courses. Rolt produced many works about subjects that had not previously been considered the stuff of literature, such as [[civil engineering]], [[canal]]s and railways. In his later years he produced three volumes of autobiography, only one of which was published during his lifetime.

Rolt also published ''Sleep No More'' (1948) a collection of supernatural horror stories featuring [[ghosts]], [[Spirit possession|possession]] and [[atavism]].<ref name="wh">{{cite book |first=William |last=Hughes |year=2013 |title=Historical Dictionary of Gothic Literature |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |isbn=978-0810872288 |page=212 }}</ref> These were modelled after the work of [[M. R. James]], but used industrial settings such as railways instead of James' "antiquarian" settings.<ref name="wh" /><ref>Neil Wilson, ''Shadows in the Attic: A Guide to British supernatural fiction, 1820-1950'' British Library, London, 2000. {{ISBN|0712310746}}. (p.433-4)</ref> ''[[The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural]]'' described ''Sleep No More'' as "An exceptionally original collection of ghost stories ... Rolt had the special talent of combining folkloric spontaneity with artful sophistication."<ref>[[Jack Sullivan (literary scholar)|Jack Sullivan]], ''The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and The Supernatural''. New York, Viking, 1986. {{ISBN|0670809020}} (p. 355).</ref> Several of Rolt's stories were anthologised; they were also adapted as radio dramas.<ref name="wh" /> His "Winterstoke" (1954) is a unique perspective on the development of modern Britain from the Feudal system via the [[dissolution of the monasteries]].

==Achievements and honours==
[[File:Tom Rolt at Tywyn Wharf - 2005-07-16.jpg|thumb|right|The Tom Rolt locomotive]]
Rolt was vice-president of the [[Newcomen Society]], which established a Rolt Prize;<ref>
{{cite web|url=http://www.newcomen.com/the-rolt-prize/|title=The Newcomen Rolt Prize|access-date=2017-05-09}}</ref> a trustee and member of the Advisory Council of the [[Science Museum (London)|Science Museum]]; a member of the [[National Railway Museum|York Railway Museum]] Committee; an honorary MA of [[University of Newcastle upon Tyne|Newcastle]]; an honorary MSc of the [[University of Bath]] (1973)<ref>{{cite web|title=Honorary Graduates 1966 to 1988|url=http://www.bath.ac.uk/ceremonies/hongrads/older.html|publisher=University of Bath|access-date=27 April 2014|archive-date=25 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160525041553/http://www.bath.ac.uk/ceremonies/hongrads/older.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> and a Fellow of the [[Royal Society of Literature]]. He was a joint founder of the [[Association for Industrial Archaeology]], which has an annual Rolt lecture. He helped to form the [[Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust]].

A locomotive ''[[Tom Rolt (locomotive)|Tom Rolt]]'' on the [[Talyllyn Railway]], the world's first preserved railway, was named in his memory in 1991.

[[File:Tom Rolt Bridge plaque road.jpg|thumb|right|Plaque at Bridge 164 on the Oxford Canal, Banbury]]
Rolt observed the changes in society resulting from the industrial-scientific revolution. In the epilogue to his biography of Brunel he wrote, two years before [[C. P. Snow]] made similar statements about the split between the arts and sciences:
<blockquote>
Men spoke in one breath of the arts and sciences, and to the man of intelligence and culture it seemed essential that he should keep himself abreast of developments in both spheres. ... So long as the artist or the man of culture had been able to advance shoulder to shoulder with engineer and scientist, and with them see the picture whole, he could share their sense of mastery and confidence, and believe wholeheartedly in material progress. But so soon as science and the arts became divorced, so soon as they ceased to speak a common language, confidence vanished, and doubts and fears came crowding in.</blockquote>
He set out these ideas more fully in his book ''High Horse Riderless'', now seen by some as a classic of green philosophy.

A bridge (no. 164) on the [[Oxford Canal]] in [[Banbury]] bears his name (in commemoration of his book ''Narrow Boat''), as does a centre at the boat museum at [[Ellesmere Port]] in Cheshire. A blue plaque to Rolt was unveiled in at [[Tooley's Boatyard]], Banbury on 7 August 2010 as part of the centenary celebrations of his birth.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://oxonblueplaques.org.uk/plaques/rolt.html |title=L. T. C. (Tom) Rolt (1910–1974) |work=Oxfordshire Blue Plaques Scheme |date=2 June 2011 |access-date=10 March 2012 }}</ref>

==Bibliography==
Rolt's work (arranged by topic in rough chronological order) includes:<ref>
{{cite book
 | author = Rogerson, Ian
 | title = L.T.C. Rolt: a bibliography
 | publisher = M & M Baldwin
 | year = 1994
 | isbn = 0-947712-04-6
 }}</ref>

===Waterways===
* ''[[Narrow Boat (book)|Narrow Boat]]'' (1944, [[Eyre & Spottiswoode]])
* ''[[Green and Silver]]'' (1949, [[George Allen & Unwin]])
* ''The Inland Waterways of England'' (1950, George Allen & Unwin)
* ''The [[River Thames|Thames]] from Mouth to Source'' (1951)
* ''Navigable Waterways'' (1969, [[Longmans]]; rpt. 1973 by Hutchinson {{ISBN|0-09-907800-7}})
* ''From Sea to Sea: The [[Canal du Midi]]'' (1973, [[Penguin Press|Allen Lane]])

===Railways===
* ''Lines of Character'' (1952, [[Constable & Robinson|Constable]]), with Patrick Whitehouse
* ''Railway Adventure'' (1953, Constable)
* ''Red for Danger: A History of Railway Accidents and Railway Safety'' (1955, [[The Bodley Head]]) <!-- {{Rolt-Red}} -->
* ''[[Patrick Stirling (railway engineer)|Patrick Stirling]]'s Locomotives'' (1964, H. Hamilton)
* ''The Making of a Railway'' (1971, Evelyn)

===Biography===
* ''[[Isambard Kingdom Brunel]]: A Biography'' (1957, Longmans)
* ''[[Thomas Telford]]'' (1958, Longmans)
* ''The [[Cornwall|Cornish]] Giant: The Story of [[Richard Trevithick]], Father of the Steam Locomotive'' (1960, Lutterworth Press)
* ''[[George Stephenson|George]] and [[Robert Stephenson]]: The Railway Revolution'' (1960, Longmans)
* ''Great Engineers'' (1962, G. Bell)
* ''[[James Watt (inventor)|James Watt]]'' (1962, [[Anova Books|Batsford]]) "Makers of Britain" series
* ''[[Thomas Newcomen]]: The Prehistory of the Steam Engine'' (1968, [[David & Charles]])

===Industrial history===
From the period of 1958 onwards, Rolt was commissioned by many engineering companies to document their history. Many of these are unpublished internal documents; only the published works are listed here.
* ''[[Holloway Brothers (London)|Holloways]] of Millbank: The First Seventy-Five Years'' (1958)
* ''The Dowty Story'' (Part I, 1962; Part II, 1973)
* ''A Hunslet Hundred: One Hundred Years of Locomotive Building by the [[Hunslet Engine Company]]'' (1964)
* {{Rolt1965}}
* ''The [[Institution of Mechanical Engineers|Mechanicals]]: Progress of a Profession'' (1967)
* ''Waterloo Ironworks: A History of Taskers of Andover, 1809–1968'' (1969)
* ''Victorian Engineering'' (1970)
* ''The Potters' Field: A History of the South Devon [[Ball clay|Ball Clay]] Industry'' (1974)

===Autobiography===
* ''Landscape with Machines'' (1971, Longman), first part of autobiography {{ISBN|0-582-10740-7}}
* ''Landscape with Canals'' (1977), second part of autobiography
* ''Landscape with Figures'' (1992), retitled third part of his autobiography
* ''The Landscape Trilogy'' (2001), gathers all three parts of autobiography in one volume

===Other===
* ''High Horse Riderless'' (1947, George Allen & Unwin), personal philosophy
* ''Sleep No More'' (1948), ghost stories
* ''[[Worcestershire]]'' (1949, Robert Hale), [[County Books series]]
* ''Horseless Carriage: The Motor Car in England'' (1950)
* ''Winterstoke'' (1954), history of a fictional Midlands town
* ''The Clouded Mirror'' (1955), travel essays<ref>{{cite web |title=In praise of... LTC Rolt |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/may/12/in-praise-of-ltc-rolt |website=Guardian|date=12 May 2011 }}</ref>
* ''The Aeronauts: A History of Ballooning, 1783–1903'' (1966; rpt. 2006 as ''The Balloonists: The History of the First Aeronauts'')
* ''Two Ghost Stories'' (1994)

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:Tom Rolt Bridge.jpg|Oxford Canal, Banbury. Bridge 164 carrying Compton Road over canal
File:Tom Rolt Bridge close.jpg|Closeup of bridge parapet showing name ''Tom Rolt Bridge''
File:Tom Rolt Bridge plaque towpath.jpg|Plaque attached to retaining wall of ''Tom Rolt Bridge'' on mooring side of canal
File:Bridge over the Shropshire Union Canal - geograph.org.uk - 678338.jpg|Bridge over the [[Shropshire Union Canal]] at Chester
File:L.T.C. Rolt Blue Plaque.JPG|Blue Plaque at [[Tooley's Boatyard]]
</gallery>

==See also==
{{Portal|United Kingdom|Transport}}
* [[Canals of the United Kingdom]]
* [[History of the British canal system]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [http://www.ltcrolt.org.uk/ L. T. C. Rolt website]

{{Talyllyn Railway}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rolt, Lionel Thomas Caswell}}
[[Category:1910 births]]
[[Category:1974 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century English memoirists]]
[[Category:20th-century English short story writers]]
[[Category:20th-century English male writers]]
[[Category:20th-century English historians]]
[[Category:People from Chester]]
[[Category:English biographers]]
[[Category:English autobiographers]]
[[Category:English non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:English short story writers]]
[[Category:English horror writers]]
[[Category:British ghost story writers]]
[[Category:Talyllyn Railway]]
[[Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature]]
[[Category:British rail transport writers]]
[[Category:Railway historians]]
[[Category:British waterways activists]]
[[Category:English male short story writers]]
[[Category:British people associated with Heritage Railways]]
[[Category:English male non-fiction writers]]