George Dow joined London and North Eastern Railway

London and North Eastern Railway

The London and North Eastern Railway was the second-largest of the "Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain...

 (LNER) as a grade five clerk at Kings Cross railway station in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. He held many offices on the LNER (particularly as Press Relations Officer throughout the Second World War) and British Railways.

He is perhaps best known as a draughtsman

Technical drawing

Technical drawing, also known as drafting or draughting, is the act and discipline of composing plans that visually communicate how something functions or has to be constructed.Drafting is the language of industry....

 for his diagrammatic railway map

Schematic

A schematic diagram represents the elements of a system using abstract, graphic symbols rather than realistic pictures. A schematic usually omits all details that are not relevant to the information the schematic is intended to convey, and may add unrealistic elements that aid comprehension...

s for the LNER and London, Midland and Scottish Railway

London, Midland and Scottish Railway

The London Midland and Scottish Railway was a British railway company. It was formed on 1 January 1923 under the Railways Act of 1921, which required the grouping of over 120 separate railway companies into just four...

 and as an inspiration to celebrated designer Harry Beck

Harry Beck

Henry Charles Beck , known as Harry Beck, was an English engineering draftsman best known for creating the present London Underground Tube map in 1931. Beck drew up the diagram in his spare time while working as an engineering draftsman at the London Underground Signals Office...

 on the Tube map

Tube map

The Tube map is a schematic transit map representing the lines and stations of London's rapid transit railway systems, namely the London Underground , the Docklands Light Railway and London Overground....

. Their work led to a style of design which has revolutionised the world of Urban rail and metro maps

Urban rail and metro maps

A transit map is a topological map in the form of a schematic diagram used to illustrate the routes and stations within a public transport system—whether this be bus lines, tramways, rapid transit, commuter rail or ferry routes...

.

On the creation of British Railways in 1948, he was appointed Public Relations and Publicity Officer for the Eastern

Eastern Region of British Railways

The Eastern Region was a region of British Railways from 1948. The region ceased to be an operating unit in its own right in the 1980s and was wound up at the end of 1992...

 & North Eastern

North Eastern Region of British Railways

The North Eastern Region was a region of British Railways from 1948. It was merged with the Eastern Region in 1967. It was the near direct post-nationalisation descendant of the North Eastern Railway, that had merged with the LNER just over 20 years early....

 Regions. In 1949 he took the same post at the larger London Midland Region

London Midland Region of British Railways

The London Midland Region was one of the six regions created on the formation of the nationalised British Railways and consisted of ex-London, Midland and Scottish Railway lines in England and Wales. The region was managed first from buildings adjacent to Euston Station and later from Stanier...

. He rose to Divisional Manager, Birmingham, and later Stoke-on-Trent

Stoke-on-Trent

Stoke-on-Trent , also called The Potteries is a city in Staffordshire, England, which forms a linear conurbation almost 12 miles long, with an area of . Together with the Borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme Stoke forms The Potteries Urban Area...

, and retired in 1968.

He also wrote twenty-one railway histories, starting with studies for the LNER, and later including his 3-volume history of the Great Central Railway

Great Central Railway

The Great Central Railway was a railway company in England which came into being when the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway changed its name in 1897 in anticipation of the opening in 1899 of its London Extension . On 1 January 1923, it was grouped into the London and North Eastern...

 and a two volume work on the carriages of the Midland Railway

Midland Railway

The Midland Railway was a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1844 to 1922, when it became part of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway....

.

He was the founding President of the Model Engineering Trade Association in 1944, and of the Historical Model Railway Society in 1950.

He died on 28 January 1987 aged 79 years.

Further reading

• Telling the Passenger Where to Get Off by Andrew Dow, Capital Transport, London, 2005. ISBN 1-85414-291-7