Talyllyn Railway

The Talyllyn Railway (Welsh: Rheilffordd Talyllyn) is a preserved narrow gauge railway line in Tywyn, Wales. Originally starting off as a line to bring down slate from the quarries at Bryn Eglwys to Tywyn, the Talyllyn Railway has evolved into a tourist attraction, seeing dozens of visitors each year.

The railway served as the inspiration for the Skarloey Railway in the Railway Series. A few of the locomotives as well as the railway itself have made appearances in the books, and the line hosts special events that see the locomotives running as their fictional counterparts.

The Awdry Connection
The Talyllyn Railway has become well known for being the inspiration of the Skarloey Railway featured in the Rev. W. Awdry's Railway Series. Awdry visited the line on a family holiday and became a volunteer soon afterwards, working as a guard. Several of the stories he wrote about the Skarloey Railway were based on incidents he experienced at the Talyllyn, and a few of the line's locomotives have made appearances in the books. Christopher (who later became vice president of the railway), his wife Diana and their son Richard were also volunteers.

In 1982, the Talyllyn Railway painted their No. 3, "Sir Haydn", in the guise of Sir Handel as an attraction for younger visitors. Christopher Awdry wrote this into Great Little Engines, explaining that the railway had "borrowed" Sir Handel for a short time. This became so popular that Sir Haydn remained dresed up until the end of the 1984 season. There was, however, some complaints from members of the Society, who disagreed with dressing up a historic engine as a fictional character. Four years later, it was decided to repeat the event, with the Railway "borrowing" Peter Sam.

"Peter Sam" ran smoothly on the Talyllyn until 1991, when The Britt Allcroft Company began organizing formal Friends of Thomas the Tank Engine events. Up until that point, heritage railways had only paid a token fee of £1 to the Thomas copyright holder to run events. Under these terms, railways would have to pay a fee of £100 for a licence plus a percentage of all profits earned from events. While most railways managed to come to agreement with Britt Allcroft in August 1991, the Talyllyn argued that as the inspiration for the Skarloey Railway, along with having received the permission of The Rev. W. Awdry himself, the agreement did not apply to them, and eventually came to a separate agreement with Reed Children's Books, holder of the Thomas copyright, in 1993.

The Narrow Gauge Railway Museum, located at Tywyn Wharf station, also hosts a display of Awdry's study, which was added in tribute of him following renovations in 2005. The display features many of Awdry's old belongings, such as his desk, typewriter and hundreds of books, and several of his models and his Ffarquhar layout can also be found here.

An event was held on August 15-16, 2021, titled "The Awdry Extravaganza", at the Talyllyn. The event featured behind-the-scenes images from the Television Series, original artwork from Railway Series illustrations, rarely-seen photographs, and early drafts of Railway Series stories. The Ulfstead Road layout was provided by the Awdry family to operate alongside Ffarquhar over the weekend. On the evening of the first day, railway enthusiast Tim Dunn presented a lecture compiled from Awdry's Railways of Sodor lectures found in the Awdry Study.

As it marked the biggest weekend in five years, the event was a massive success and becoming a must-go-to annual event for Thomas and the Railway Series fans young and old.

Locomotives
The Talyllyn Railway owns eleven locomotives, six steam and five diesel. Talyllyn, Dolgoch and Douglas have made appearances in the Railway Series, though the rest of the engines have made no appearances. This section only documents the locomotives with Skarloey Railway counterparts.

Appearances
Railway Series=

The Railway Series

 * The Little Old Engine - Little Old Twins
 * Very Old Engines - Crosspatch and Duck and Dukes
 * Great Little Engines - Patience is a Virtue and Sir Handel Comes Home
 * New Little Engine - Sir Handel's Plan and Dirty Water

Trivia

 * Many of the sound effects used in the first series of Thomas & Friends were recorded specially on the Talyllyn Railway.
 * In 1997, Britt Allcroft attempted to sue the Talyllyn Railway for dressing up their engines as their Thomas counterparts, despite the fact Awdry approved of this. This lawsuit attempt failed.
 * During the production of Blue Mountain Mystery, the animation crew of Nitrogen Studios went to the Talyllyn Railway to measure the engines for the CGI models of their Skarloey Railway counterparts to match them. However, Douglas was being overhauled during that time, hence why Duncan did not appear in the film. He did not return until the eighteenth series, two years later, but Arc Productions did not take measurements of Douglas when they modeled Duncan. As such, he is not as accurate to his real-life counterpart as the other engines.