People Gallery

Bather, August 1931

GWR publicity image of a woman wearing a diamond patterned swimming costume and cap leaning over a wall at the seaside in August 1931

1930s, 1931, Bathe, Bather, Beach, Fashion, Lady, Leisure, Nostalgia, Publicity, Sea, Seaside, Swimmer, Swimming, Swimming Costume, Tourism, Woman, Women

No 9 Shop, Sewing Room, August 1914

The date of this photograph is 7th August 1914. Just three days after Britain entered the war. By this date there were already women employed at Swindon Works and this view of the Sewing Room in the Carriage and Wagon Works shows approximately 30 women working on fabric items for carriages. From Swindon Works war records we know that requests were made from the Government for items such as first aid stretchers, cots and mattresses for ambulance trains and blankets. These would have come through the sewing room to be worked on and completed

© STEAM Museum of the GWR

Women workers in the Permanent Way Dept at Reading, 1943

Three ladies from the Permanent Way Department are pictured here at Reading in April 1943 off-loading wooden blocks from a wagon. This photograph is an official Company image, with GWR Chief Engineers Office, Aldermaston. Photographic Department' stamped on the reverse. The photo may have been taken to show the work of women during the war, but equally it might have been taken to show joint working between the GWR and LMS whose wagon features in the image. Inter-railway working between the railway companies was actively encouraged by the Government during the war as a means of maintaining an efficient and economic rail service, so staff and rolling stock worked across the different networks in a way that had not been seen previously