John Prentice has very kindly given permission to use some text, from his excellent and very interesting Tramway Information website. We are also most grateful to Mr Prentice for the permission to use the images taken from his extensive collection of historic tram postcards.
Opening of London County Council Electric Tramways (1903)
The Prince of Wales (later to become King George V) is about to board the car. The opening ceremony took place on 15 May 1903 at 3.30pm. Prior to this there had been a seated banquet for 2,334 people in a huge marquee set up in the grounds of the adjacent St. Thomas’ Hospital. The first tram was started by the Prince of Wales and was then driven to Tooting by the Tramways Manager, Alfred Baker. Mr John Williams Benn, the Chairman of the L.C.C. Highways Committee, acted as conductor collecting the halfpenny fare and issuing special tickets printed blue and gold. Also present on the tram were the Princess of Wales, her two small sons Edward and Albert, Mr Gerald Balfour – President of the Board of Trade, and Lord Monkswell – Chairman of the L.C.C. At Tooting the party visited local workmen’s housing built by the L.C.C. and then they returned to Westminster on the top deck of the tram.The vehicle was number 86 of class A. This was one of a batch of 100 ordered from Dick Kerr of Preston. The bodies were built by the Electric Railway and Tramway Carriage Co. Ltd. They had Dick Kerr DB1 form D controllers, and a pair of Brill 22E bogies, each with a 30 horsepower Dick Kerr 3A4 motor. One bogie in each pair was modified to take the plough for the conduit current collection used by the L.C.C. The cars seated 66, 28 inside and 38 on top. As built the trams were open topped, but within the first few years had received top covers.Special car 86 was painted white and was decorated with evergreen and fern. Inside, the wooden seats were replaced by pale blue and pink armchairs and, to complete the luxury, blue and white curtains and blue carpet had been fitted.The view is of Westminster Bridge Road.John Prentice
London County Council Car 320 on Westminster Bridge, London (1906)
The tram is of the London County Council Tramways, being car 320 of their class D. The class was built in 1904 by the Brush Electrical Engineering Company at Loughborough, running on maximum traction bogie trucks made by the McGuire Company. These trams were originally open topped and the top covers, built by Milnes Voss, were added one or two years later.Between the rails in the foreground of the view, the slot of the conduit system of current collection can clearly be seen. Instead of using overhead wires, which the L.C.C. thought were unsightly for the centre of London, the electricity was picked up from two conductor rails beneath the road surface by means of a device (known as a plough) attached to the tram and which ran in the slot.John Prentice
London County Council Car 186, Blackfriars (c 1908)
Car 186 was one of a batch of 100 4-wheel trams of class B ordered from Dick Kerr at the commencement of electric tramways and delivered in 1903. They had the standard “Preston” type three window body built by the English Railway and Carriage Co. Ltd., seating 22 passengers on the lower deck and 34 on the upper, with Dick Kerr DB1 form D controllers and two DK25A 25 horse power motors. They were mounted on Brill 21E trucks of 6ft. 6in. wheelbase with the plough carrier fixed midway between the axles. As built, these cars were open top with reversed stairs but from 1904 onwards they were fitted with top covers, at first open balcony and later with enclosed upper decks as in our postcard. The reversed stairs were replaced by direct stairs from 1906 giving a better driver’s view and allowing the police restriction of a top speed of 12 m.p.h. to be raised to 16 m.p.h. They were painted in the L.C.C. livery of purple lake and cream (primrose). (Note the tram’s upper deck advertisement has been retouched to read “Star Post Cards”.)The electric tram service from Blackfriars to New Cross and Peckham commenced on 17th January 1904. The terminus at Blackfriars had three tracks with the passenger shelter in in the middle of the road. Blackfriars Bridge was too narrow for tramways but was widened and the tracks were extended over the bridge and onto the Embankment opening on 14th September 1909, from which time the normal use of the Blackfriars terminus was discontinued and the shelter removed, although the third stub track remained until the closure of tramways in 1952.John Prentice