Talk:Dandy waggon

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[edit] Unanswered Questions

Jeepday 04:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

  • What is the correlation between the name of the Dandy Waggon and the use of Dandy to refer to a man’s appearance and bearing?

I think you will find it in the comment - "It looks dandy, a horse riding in a wagon" --Keith

  • On what date was the Dandy Waggon (or Cart) first used?

On the FR, from the commencement of services sometime 1836 --Keith

Queen Anne (1702-1714) is reported to have transported a race horse in in horse drawn conveyance 100 years before the dandy wagon [1] [2]. both of the articles I found on line use the same reference "Cregier SE. Land transportation of the horse. Live Animal Trade and Transport Magazine 1989; November: 43-44". I did not find the article or any other references to the act online.
  • What is the longest continuous stretch of rail for a horse to ride the Dandy Waggon

On the FR this would be 1 stage, which may be up to 4 mile. Obviously this will vary on other systems --Keith

  • Was transporting horses in wheeled vehicles invented in the 1820s or does the action predate railways? I can almost imagine a medieval child of royal heritage insisting on bringing a favorite pony on a trip where 6 strong horses are going to pull a carriage a long distance and a frazzled parent ordering a pony cart built to tow the pony behind the carriage.

[edit] FR Heritage Group Wiki

you may find the FR Heritage Group Wiki of interest, specifically with respect to the working of gravity slate trains. Curiously there is no article about Dandy Waggons. The extant Dandy Waggon is listed as No. 50 on the waggon list page. Stewart 17:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the reference, following are discoveries to merge into the article
Shortly after the above comment was made, this was corrected. There is now an article on the FR Wiki here. complete with picture --Keith 21:29, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
  • 4-wheel Iron Horse Dandy - built c1861 at Boston Lodge; used by horses resting and feeding on the down gravity run between stage stations. Old Ffestiniog Railway No [3] Merged into article Jeepday 04:42, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • In 1830, shortly after Madocks death, Samuel Holland, who was quarrying slate at Rhiw, joined Henry Archer, a young businessman from Dublin, to promote the Festiniog Railway, incorporated by Act of Parliament on 23 May 1832. James Spooner from Worcestershire was responsible for the survey and construction of the Railway. The route, whose final mile crossed the Cob, enabled loaded slate trains to run down by gravity while the horses that were used to haul the empty wagons back up the line could feed and rest in dandy wagons. Paragraph 3 [4]
  • When the Festiniog Railway opened in 1836 all "down" trains were worked by gravity. The "up" trains were horse hauled - the horses riding back down again in special dandy wagon's. Passenger trains (introduced in 1863) were initially run in Down the line under gravity; goods, followed by passengers, followed by the locomotive (to give a shove if required?). This practice was very swiftly curtailed by the Board of Trade. The practice of running slate trains down by gravity continued right up to the start of WW2. Paragraph 1 [5]
And has continued in the preservation period, albeit for demonstration purposes only --Keith 21:29, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
  • [6] Reference Dandy in the Heritage Group Journal If you have access to these old issues and can reference them in the article please do so.
    • Issue 11 page 7
    • Issue 13 page 17
    • Issue 17 page 2

Jeepday 03:52, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Festiniog Railway Heritage Group Wiki Copyright notice - All original text is distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License. Articles may contain text or images used with permission of the copyright holder or under the copyright "fair use" doctrine. In all such cases the text or images concerned are NOT available under the GNU Free Documentation License. If you wish to use such text or images you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holder. [7] Jeepday 04:06, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

The above copyright notice is based on the similar for main Wiki. --Keith 21:29, 17 August 2007 (UTC) who is also a FR Wiki volunteer editor.