Mr. Beck's Locomotive

GB Railfreight Class 66 Diesel Locomotive 66721 'Harry Beck' at London, Victoria

The Tube Map is an iconic design and if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery by any standards the world’s most flattered mapmaker must be Harry Beck who devised the famous diagrammatic London Underground Tube Map. Harry Beck's contribution to cartography was belatedly recognised after his death with one of the most satisfying memorials being the naming of a Class 66 Diesel Locomotive 66721 'Harry Beck' after him. This was acquired by one of the Private Infrastructure Companies under the ill fated PPP scheme and decked out in Metronet Livery with the Harry Beck nameplate. Metronet collapsed in 2007 but strangely the loco which was acquired by GB Railfreight has been going around the UK rail system as the ghost of Metronet past in the livery of a company which no longer exists. 

This omission has now been rectified and Loco "Harry Beck" has now been decked out in a smart new livery featuring the updated version of Mr. Beck's famous map as the photo above taken this week at London Victoria Station shows.

Traveller's on London's Underground who rely on the system’s map to get around would be amazed to discover the blueprint was rejected at first as ‘too radical’. However, common sense eventually prevailed and after a few modifications to the simple design by Harry Beck, a trial pocket version was published in 1933. The reaction of the travelling public was overwhelming, with all 700,000 copies snapped up within a month.

Metronet - Renewing the Tube and Working in Partnership? - Not really!

He apparently worked on the design in his own time and was only paid five guineas (£5.25). Last week, 80 years on, an English Heritage blue plaque was unveiled in Leyton to commemorate his map. The plaque was placed on the building Harry was born in at 14 Wesley Road. Sadly, for much of his lifetime Harry did not receive any recognition, leaving London Underground to teach typography and colour design at the London School of Printing and Kindred Trades.

The blue plaque in Leyton recognising Harry Beck

A plaque near Harry Beck's home in Finchley

However, in recent years the importance of his design has been celebrated. Voted the second favourite British design of the 20th Century, the series of coloured lines are as iconic a symbol of London as Tower Bridge or Big Ben. There is now a ‘Beck Gallery’ at the London Transport Museum, a stamp was produced to commemorate the Tube map and Harry even has a locomotive named after him. Harry worked as an engineering draughtsman at the London Underground Signals Office and his career was relatively unremarkable until in 1931, when he proposed a radical new design to illustrate the rapidly expanding underground system.

For the story of this British design icon and the man behind it see Mr. Beck's Map;

http://daithaic.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/mr-becks-map.html