James the Red Engine is a fictional anthropomorphic red tender locomotive from The Railway Series children's books by the Reverend Awdry and the TV series adaptation Thomas & Friends. He has a 2-6-0 ("Mogul") wheel arrangement and is engine number 5 on the North Western Railway, the Fat Controller's railway on the Island of Sodor.
James first appeared in The Railway Series in 1946, in the book Thomas the Tank Engine. Two books in the series, no. 3 James the Red Engine and no. 28 James and the Diesel Engines, are dedicated to James.
Prototype and Behind the scenes
James first appeared in The Railway Series in the 1946 book Thomas the Tank Engine. He was named after James Furze, a friend of the publisher's son. He was originally painted black. At the request of the publishers, Awdry dedicated James the Red Engine to the character. James was painted red in this and subsequent books.
James is based on the L&YR Class 28, an mixed-traffic tender engine designed by George Hughes and based on the earlier L&YR Class 27 designed by John Aspinall. According to Awdry, the Class 28s were powerful engines but had a tendency to be nose-heavy, especially when used as relief engines on excursion trains and driven at speed. In the book The Island of Sodor: Its People, History and Railways, Awdry gave a fictional history of the engine. James was built by Hughes as an experiment to see if the nose-heaviness could be counteracted. The locomotive was fitted with larger driving wheels and a pony truck, making it into a . (The real Class 28 has wheels.) James is also missing the prominent front sandboxes fitted to the Class 28s. The improvement was not as great as hoped for and after the grouping, the LMS sold James to the Fat Controller's North Western Railway.
James as a model
Awdry had two models of James on his OO gauge model railway. The first, from the 1950s, was based on a 2-6-0 Glasgow and South Western Railway locomotive, the Austrian Goods, designed by Peter Drummond, which is the very same engine that Awdry had originally envisioned James as but changed it due to unknown reasons. Awdry's model was painted red with yellow lining. Despite being professionally made and "a beautiful model", the motor was so unreliable that the loco could not be used for regular services. Awdry later noted that it was sent away in the 1980s for a new motor and chassis and came back "completely transformed".
Awdry's second model of James was based on a 1960s Tri-ang Johnson 3F 0-6-0; a conversion which Hornby themselves would use for the production version of their model of James, several decades later.
James in The Railway Series
James the Red Engine was the third book in the Railway Series by Reverend W. Awdry. It picked up where the previous book, Thomas The Tank Engine, left off, as James was introduced in "Thomas & The Breakdown Train" where the Troublesome Trucks pushed him into a field after his wooden brake blocks caught fire.
James and the Top Hat
The Fat Controller has given James a new coat of red paint, to cheer him up after the accident on his first day, and becomes rather conceited. He lets off steam and accidentally sprays water on the Fat Controller's new top hat. He hurries Edward and the coaches away in panic and initially pulls too far from their first stop station platform. After meeting Thomas again, he focuses enough to move their train over Gordon's Hill, and he and Edward laugh about its comical name origin, which unfortunately leads to James' laughter becoming hiccups, frightening an elderly passenger. After an eventful day, James is content with his success, yet worried about the Fat Controller's response.
James and the Bootlace
The next day, the Fat Controller (still cross over his hat's dampening) threatens to repaint James blue if he continues to cause trouble. An upset James is impatient and rough with the coaches, to where their resistance brings a leak in the brake pipe, which his driver, fireman, and conductor mend with newspaper and a passenger's bootlace, after coercing the only passenger with a bootlace to reluctantly hand it over. Once the hole has been mended, James miserably resolves not to bump coaches as he awaits the outcome.
