based Thomas on this prototype belonging to the
LB&SCR E2 class. Awdry based Thomas on a wooden toy made for his son Christopher. This toy looked rather different from the character in the books and television series, and carried the letters NW on its side tanks, which stood for "No Where" according to Awdry. The first Thomas model was not based on a prototype. After Awdry's wife encouraged him to publish the stories of the first book
The Three Railway Engines, Awdry wrote a second book
Thomas the Tank Engine featuring the titular character. The publishers selected artist Reginald Payne to illustrate the book, who designed Thomas after a
Billinton-designed E2 Class of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway. Payne was not credited for his illustrations at the time, and it is only since the publication of
Brian Sibley's
The Thomas the Tank Engine Man that he has received recognition. After Payne died of a nervous breakdown in 1947, the book was re-illustrated by
C. Reginald Dalby, who remains the only artist credited in current publications of the book. The models of Thomas used in the
Thomas & Friends television series and produced by Hornby are based on the E2 locomotives fitted with an extension to the front of the water tanks. Awdry was unsatisfied with one detail of the illustration; the front end of his
running board sloped downward, which meant that his front and back
buffers were at different heights. This was an illustrator's mistake that was perpetuated in subsequent books. The crash seen in
Thomas Comes to Breakfast was partly devised as a means of correcting this. All of the prototype
LB&SCR E2 class locomotives were scrapped between 1961 and 1963. Thomas locomotives used on
Day Out with Thomas days on
heritage railways are either unpowered replicas or converted from other locomotives.
Voice acting Like the rest of the cast, Thomas did not initially have an individual voice in the English
dub of the television series; the
voice acting consisted entirely of
narration by various actors, including
Ringo Starr and
Michael Angelis. During production of the film adaptation
Thomas and the Magic Railroad (2000), director and series creator
Britt Allcroft was impressed by the voice of John Bellis—a firefighter and part-time taxi driver—when he picked up Allcroft via taxi. Allcroft subsequently cast Bellis as the voice of Thomas, commenting to her colleagues that she "just heard the voice of Thomas" and that Bellis "is exactly how Thomas would sound". However, criticism from a
test screening resulted in Bellis being replaced with voice actor
Edward Glen, credited under Eddie Glen. The television series would continue to be fully narrated until the release of the feature-length special
Thomas & Friends: Hero of the Rails (2009), in which all of the characters had individual voice actors once more.
Martin Sherman was cast as Thomas in the
American dub, with
Ben Small being cast in the
British dub. These two would continue to voice Thomas in the television series and subsequent specials until
Thomas & Friends: Tale of the Brave (2014), after which the former quit due to payment disputes with the film and TV series' production company
HIT Entertainment. ==Biography==