WILL the real James Spooner please step forward? Following its debut at the Ffestiniong & Welsh Highland Railways’ October 6-8 Bygones weekend, the current holder of the mantle for ‘newest steam locomotive in the world’ was officially named at a ceremony hosted at Blaenau Ffestiniog on October 20.
The naming was carried out in the presence of not only the local community and invited dignitaries, but also descendants of both the man responsible for overseeing the Ffestiniog Railway's construction and one responsible for the iconic double Fairlie design.
Born in 1790 in Powick, Worcestershire, James Spooner was employed as a surveyor when he first went to North Wales. He lived in Morga Lodge, Porthmadog, when he was tasked with surveying a route from there to the slate mining town of Blaenau Ffestiniog, a job he undertook in 1830/1 (having first surveyed a route for what would become the Croesor Tramway, latterly the Welsh
