Sir William Arthur Stanier was born in
Swindon, where his father worked for the
Great Western Railway (GWR) as
William Dean's Chief Clerk, and educated at Swindon High School and also, for a single year, at
Wycliffe College. In 1891 he followed his father into a career with the GWR, initially as an office boy and then for five years as an apprentice in the workshops. Between 1897 and 1900 he worked in the Drawing Office as a
draughtsman, before becoming Inspector of Materials in 1900. In 1904,
George Jackson Churchward appointed him as Assistant to the Divisional
Locomotive Superintendent in
London. In 1912 he returned to Swindon to become the Assistant Works Manager and in 1920 was promoted to the post of Works Manager. In late 1931, he was "headhunted" by Sir
Josiah Stamp, chairman of the
London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS), to become the Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) of that railway from 1 January 1932. He was charged with introducing modern and more powerful locomotive designs, using his knowledge gained with the GWR at Swindon. Stanier built many successful designs for the LMS, particularly the
"Black 5" mixed traffic 4-6-0 and the
8F 2-8-0 freight locomotive. His
Princess Coronation Class 4-6-2 No.6220 Coronation set a new British record of 114 mph, beating the previous record set by a Gresley A4. During WWII, Stanier worked as a consultant for the
Ministry of Supply, and retired in 1944. He was knighted on 9 February 1943 and elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society on his retirement, only the third locomotive engineer after
Edward Bury and
Robert Stephenson to receive
that honour. He was also president of the
Institution of Mechanical Engineers for 1944, and was a vice president of the
Stephenson Locomotive Society for a number of years until his death in 1965. He died in
Rickmansworth in 1965. In 1906, he had married Ella Elizabeth, daughter of Levi L Morse. They had a son and a daughter. ==Locomotive designs==