Harold Winthrop Clapp
Encyclopedia
Sir Harold Winthrop Clapp KBE
(7 May 1875 – 21 October 1952) was a transport administrator who over the course of thirty years had a profound effect on Australia
's railway network. In two decades as its Chairman of Commissioners, he revolutionised Victorian Railways
, with unprecedented attention to customer service and innovations such as more powerful locomotives, air-conditioned carriages, and faster services culminating in the introduction of the flagship Spirit of Progress
express train. Seconded to the Federal Government
in World War II
, he played a pivotal role in the manufacture of fighter aircraft in the defence of Australia. As Director-General of Australia's Land Transport Board, he presented a report on railway gauge standardisation that ultimately led to the eventual linking of all Australian mainland capital cities by a uniform rail gauge
.
, Harold Clapp was the son of Cobb and Co
coach operator and future Melbourne Tramway and Omnibus Company
owner Francis Boardman Clapp and wife Isabella Pinnock, née Pierce. He was educated at Brighton Grammar
and Melbourne Church of England Grammar
schools, before serving an apprenticeship at the Austral Otis Enigineering Co. and later taking charge of motive power his father's Brisbane Tramway Co. Ltd.
In 1900 Clapp left for the United States of America, first obtaining work at the General Electric Co.
He was then engaged by the Interborough Rapid Transit Co.
, and among other work was in charge of electrification of the West Jersey and Seashore division of the Pennsylvania Railroad
. On 19 September 1906 at Providence, Rhode Island, he married Gertrude Vivien, daughter of Judge Arthur Noel of Brisbane
. In 1908 he moved to Columbus, Ohio
and joined the Southern Pacific Railroad
. By 1920, he was a Vice President of the Southern Pacific, as well as the Columbus Railway Power and Light Co and Illinois
' East St. Louis and Suburban Railway
.
appointed Clapp as Chairman of the Commissioners of Victorian Railways in September 1920 on the recommendation of former Chairman Sir Thomas James Tait
, who had known Clapp prior to his move to the United States. With an annual salary of £
5,000, Clapp was Australia's highest-paid public servant at the time.
Clapp arrived in September 1920, and began an extraordinary period of reform of Victorian Railways. During his tenure, timetables were improved, larger and more powerful locomotives were built, services were improved, and the VR expanded operations into everything from motor coach services, a ski chalet, and creches to bakeries and raisin bread marketing.
and future Prime Minister of Australia
Robert Menzies
.
Harold Clapp famously quipped that "The railway is ninety-five percent men and five percent iron." He was possessed of a remarkable memory and learnt the names and faces of many thousands of railway employees. He regarded stationmasters, who dealt with the public at many levels, as "his front line soldiers". Although his approach to industrial relations has been judged as paternalistic
, his concern for workers' conditions was genuine and he was personally responsible for improvements such as better sanitation facilities and the provision of decent cafeterias at Newport Workshops.
Harold Clapp's fastidiousness for cleanliness was legendary. He was reputed to polish his shoes up to eight times a day, was renowned for running a finger along high shelves of country railway stations checking for dust, and earned the nickname "Clever Mary", after a popular brand of household cleaning product of the time.
Clapp's cleanliness was matched by his punctuality, a quality he expected in his employees and in his railway. Improvements in service reliability earned the ultimate compliment by way of the following complaint published in a Melbourne newspaper: "Mr Clapp's fiendish efficiency means that we have lost another excuse for being late for work in the mornings."
At the time that Harold Clapp took over, the VR goods locomotive fleet was almost completely of 19th Century designs that were largely obsolete. Clapp set about modernising the fleet, firstly with construction commencing in 1921 of 25 further examples of the prototype C class
heavy goods locomotive of 1918, as well as introducing three new classes of locomotive which proved to be of highly successful design, the K class
and N class
light-lines locomotives of 1922 and 1925, and the X class
heavy goods locomotive of 1929. With a large fleet of relatively new A2 class
locomotives available, there was far less development of new passenger locomotives during the Clapp era. Even so, the two classes that were ordered during his time (the 3-cylinder S
and H
classes) were of unprecedented size, power and technical innovation.
As an efficiency measure, Clapp dispensed with the "Canadian Red" locomotive livery introduced by his predecessor Sir Thomas Tait, replacing it with a plain black livery that required less cleaning. In other key developments that drew on his US railroad experience, he oversaw the introduction of electric lighting on VR locomotives and the fitting of auto-couplers.
Clapp also oversaw the introduction of important innovations in alternative motive power. These included the E class
electric suburban goods locomotives and the introduction of rail motor
s to provide faster, more cost effective services than steam locomotives.
and Geelong to just one hour, using existing rolling stock hauled by an A2 class
locomotive of 1907 design. In 1935 Clapp raised the maximum line speed limit on Victorian Railways from 60 to 70 mph (96 to 112 km/h) and the Flier subsequently ran to Geelong on a 55 minute timetable. The public relations success of the Flier was reflected by the train's name entering the local lexicon as a metaphor for speed; former Geelong Football Club
player Bob Davis was nicknamed "The Geelong Flier"; and even in 2005 current player David Wojcinski
was said to "run like the Geelong Flier of yesteryear".
Similarly, the Adelaide Express was renamed The Overland in 1926, despite some reluctance from the South Australia
n authorities who jointly ran the inter-capital service. Clapp oversaw the reduction in running time for the service from sixteen and a half hours in 1928 to around fourteen hours in 1938 (with the departure time changed from 4:30pm to a much more convenient 7:00pm), achieved at very moderate cost simply through the introduction of Automatic Staff Exchange equipment between Ballarat and Serviceton
to allow unimpeded progress from one track section to the next, and design improvements to the existing A2 class locomotive fleet to increase power and efficiency.
s. On his return, he began work on his ultimate project, upgrade of the Sydney Limited service into the all-steel, all-air-conditioned, non-stop, high-speed express streamliner
, the Spirit of Progress
.
Clapp's decision to invest considerable funds into the Spirit of Progress was based on entirely pragmatic considerations. In an age before interstate air travel was common, politicians and heads of industry rode between Australia's two largest capital cities and the national capital Canberra
by train. The upgrade of the service was then a smart investment in promoting the Victorian Railways brand and its reputation to the nation's most powerful and influential people.
The train was truly world class, running non-stop along its entire 190.5 mile (306.5 km) length at an average speed of 52 mph (83 km/h) between Albury and Melbourne, a speed comparable to that of the legendary Flying Scotsman
service of the London and North Eastern Railway
. Harold Clapp's personal involvement in its design and construction was all-encompassing, from the auto-couplers connecting the carriages to the Art Deco
interior design.
Clapp's time at Victorian Railways is often viewed as being the halcyon days for the organisation. However, during Clapp's tenure the VR was already struggling to match new competition from road transport, as well as to remain profitable despite the legacy of a network of short, inefficient branch line
s built in the late nineteenth century for reasons of political expediency rather than economic merit, challenges that were to bedevil Clapp's successors. The VR only turned a profit in two of the nearly twenty years that he was at its helm.
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In May 1939, with the outbreak of World War II
imminent, Clapp was seconded by then Prime Minister Robert Menzies to become general manager of the Aircraft Construction Branch
of the Commonwealth Department of Supply and Development, overseeing the construction of Bristol Beaufort
bombers in Australia. He was made chairman of the new Aircraft Production Commission in March next year.
Although Beaufort bombers were advanced aluminium aircraft requiring complex and previously untried assembly processes, the first flew as early as August 1941. During 1942 they were delivered at the rate of sixteen per month and in 1943 at 29 per month. The last of 700 was delivered in August 1944, by which time production had shifted to Beaufighter fighter-bomber, of which 364 were completed by the end of the war.
Clapp was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in the 1941 New Year Honours
"[f]or public services in the Commonwealth of Australia."
In February 1942, Clapp was appointed Director-General of Land Transport by the Curtin
Government to co-ordinate Commonwealth and State road and rail transport. In 1944, he was asked to prepare a report on the standardisation of rail gauge
s in Australia.
The Second World War, in generating greatly increased rail traffic through the shipment of men, munitions and supplies around the country, exposed the inefficiency of a national rail system built on several systems built to different gauges. Multiple break-of-gauge
points across the country between 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) narrow gauge
, 4 ft 8½ in (1,435 mm) standard gauge
and 5 ft 3 in (1,600 mm) broad gauge
compromised the ability of the railways to support the war effort and required upwards of 1,600 men at various break-of-gauge points to transfer cargo from one train to another.
Clapp submitted a national rail plan for the complete conversion of the Victorian and South Australian broad-gauge networks to standard gauge, the conversion of the Silverton Tramway
and south-east South Australia
n narrow gauge lines to standard gauge, and the linking of Perth to Kalgoorlie by a new standard gauge link, at a cost of £
44,318,000. He further recommended and the linking of Darwin to the national network via a new standard gauge link to be built from Queensland at a cost of £10,898,000, and a new inland standard gauge link through New South Wales and Queensland, cost £21,565,000.
Parorchial state interests thwarted the plan from being adopted. New South Wales refused to ratify the agreement as only a relatively small proportion of the project cost would be spent in NSW, where almost all track was already standard gauge. South Australia objected to the Darwin link being built from Queensland rather than extending the existing Central Australia Railway link from Adelaide
to Alice Springs.
Clapp's report was used in 1956 as a basis for further recommendations by the Government Members Rail Standardisation Committee chaired by William Wentworth, which concluded that "while there may be considerable doubts as to the justification for undertaking large-scale standardisation of Australian railways under present circumstances, there can be no doubt that the standardisation of main trunk lines is not only justified, but long over due." By 1962, Melbourne was linked to Sydney by a standard gauge link, and by 1970 the standardisation of the transcontinental link from Sydney to Perth was completed.
Another key element of Clapp's 1945 proposal was delivered, at least in part, with the standardisation of the broad gauge Crystal Brook
line connecting Adelaide to the transcontinental Sydney-Perth railway in 1982, followed by the standardisation of South Australia's non-metropolitan broad gauge network and most of the broad gauge network in western Victoria in 1995, including the main Melbourne-Adelaide railway.
In September 1951 Clapp resigned for health reasons but continued to act as a consultant to the Department of Shipping and Transport. On 14 July 1952 the first of the B class diesel electric locomotives, which were to revolutionise train operations in Victoria, was delivered to the VR and travelled from NSW to Melbourne's Spencer Street Station under its own power. The elderly Harold Clapp climbed into the cab of locomotive B 60 and sat at the controls, and was honoured by having the new locomotive named after him.
On 21 October 1952 he died in hospital, leaving behind his wife, two sons and a daughter. Tributes were paid by many, including then Prime Minister Robert Menzies. Journalist C. R. Bradish described him as "a remarkable man", with "sufficient power and imagination to give the Victorian Railways a reputation they had never known before".
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(7 May 1875 – 21 October 1952) was a transport administrator who over the course of thirty years had a profound effect on Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
's railway network. In two decades as its Chairman of Commissioners, he revolutionised Victorian Railways
Victorian Railways
The Victorian Railways operated railways in the Australian state of Victoria from 1859 to 1983. The first railways in Victoria were private companies, but when these companies failed or defaulted, the Victorian Railways was established to take over their operations...
, with unprecedented attention to customer service and innovations such as more powerful locomotives, air-conditioned carriages, and faster services culminating in the introduction of the flagship Spirit of Progress
Spirit of Progress
The Spirit of Progress was the premier express train passenger service on the Victorian Railways in Australia, running from Melbourne to the Victorian border, and later through to Sydney.-Route:...
express train. Seconded to the Federal Government
Government of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia is a federal constitutional monarchy under a parliamentary democracy. The Commonwealth of Australia was formed in 1901 as a result of an agreement among six self-governing British colonies, which became the six states...
in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, he played a pivotal role in the manufacture of fighter aircraft in the defence of Australia. As Director-General of Australia's Land Transport Board, he presented a report on railway gauge standardisation that ultimately led to the eventual linking of all Australian mainland capital cities by a uniform rail gauge
Rail gauge
Track gauge or rail gauge is the distance between the inner sides of the heads of the two load bearing rails that make up a single railway line. Sixty percent of the world's railways use a standard gauge of . Wider gauges are called broad gauge; smaller gauges, narrow gauge. Break-of-gauge refers...
.
Early life and career abroad
Born in St Kilda, VictoriaSt Kilda, Victoria
St Kilda is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 6 km south from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Port Phillip...
, Harold Clapp was the son of Cobb and Co
Cobb and Co
Cobb and Co is the name of a transportation company in Australia. It was prominent in the late 19th century when it operated stagecoaches to many areas in the outback and at one point in several other countries, as well....
coach operator and future Melbourne Tramway and Omnibus Company
Melbourne cable tramway system
The Melbourne cable tramway system was a cable car public transportation system operated from 1885 to 1940 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia....
owner Francis Boardman Clapp and wife Isabella Pinnock, née Pierce. He was educated at Brighton Grammar
Brighton Grammar School
Brighton Grammar School is an independent, Anglican, day school for boys, located in Brighton, a south-eastern suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia....
and Melbourne Church of England Grammar
Melbourne Grammar School
Melbourne Grammar School is an independent, Anglican, day and boarding school predominantly for boys, located in South Yarra and Caulfield, suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia....
schools, before serving an apprenticeship at the Austral Otis Enigineering Co. and later taking charge of motive power his father's Brisbane Tramway Co. Ltd.
Trams in Brisbane
The Brisbane tramway network once served Brisbane, the capital city of Queensland, Australia. It operated between 1885 and 1969 and ran on standard gauge track. The electric system was originally energised to 500 volts, and subsequently increased to 600 volts. All tramcars built in Brisbane up to...
In 1900 Clapp left for the United States of America, first obtaining work at the General Electric Co.
General Electric
General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...
He was then engaged by the Interborough Rapid Transit Co.
Interborough Rapid Transit Company
The Interborough Rapid Transit Company was the private operator of the original underground New York City Subway line that opened in 1904, as well as earlier elevated railways and additional rapid transit lines in New York City. The IRT was purchased by the City in June 1940...
, and among other work was in charge of electrification of the West Jersey and Seashore division of the Pennsylvania Railroad
Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
. On 19 September 1906 at Providence, Rhode Island, he married Gertrude Vivien, daughter of Judge Arthur Noel of Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
. In 1908 he moved to Columbus, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus is the capital of and the largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio. The broader metropolitan area encompasses several counties and is the third largest in Ohio behind those of Cleveland and Cincinnati. Columbus is the third largest city in the American Midwest, and the fifteenth largest city...
and joined the Southern Pacific Railroad
Southern Pacific Railroad
The Southern Pacific Transportation Company , earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or Espee, was an American railroad....
. By 1920, he was a Vice President of the Southern Pacific, as well as the Columbus Railway Power and Light Co and Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
' East St. Louis and Suburban Railway
East St. Louis and Suburban Railway
The East St. Louis and Suburban Railway was an interurban railroad that operated in Illinois.-Route:It served Madison County, St. Clair County, and Monroe County as part of the great "East Side Electric Railway System." It stretched from the Eads Bridge, which crossed the Mississippi River from...
.
Victorian Railways career
Premier Harry LawsonHarry Lawson
Sir Harry Sutherland Wightman Lawson KCMG , Australian politician, was the 27th Premier of Victoria.Lawson was born in Dunolly, the son of a Presbyterian clergyman of Scottish descent. He was educated at a local school and then briefly Scotch College in Melbourne. He was a noted Australian rules...
appointed Clapp as Chairman of the Commissioners of Victorian Railways in September 1920 on the recommendation of former Chairman Sir Thomas James Tait
Thomas James Tait
Sir Thomas James Tait was a Canadian-born rail executive.Born in Melbourne, Quebec, the son of Melbourne McTaggart Tait, Tait entered the service of the Grand Trunk Railway in 1880, and by 1903 he was manager of transportation with Canadian Pacific Railway company.In March 1903 Tait was appointed...
, who had known Clapp prior to his move to the United States. With an annual salary of £
Australian pound
The pound was the currency of Australia from 1910 until 13 February 1966, when it was replaced by the Australian dollar. It was subdivided into 20 shillings, each of 12 pence.- Earlier Australian currencies :...
5,000, Clapp was Australia's highest-paid public servant at the time.
Clapp arrived in September 1920, and began an extraordinary period of reform of Victorian Railways. During his tenure, timetables were improved, larger and more powerful locomotives were built, services were improved, and the VR expanded operations into everything from motor coach services, a ski chalet, and creches to bakeries and raisin bread marketing.
Management style
Clapp enjoyed cordial relations with his staff, union officials, and was fortunate to have the support of highly capable Railways Ministers from both sides of politics, including future Premier of Victoria John CainJohn Cain (senior)
John Cain was an Australian politician, who became the 34th premier of Victoria, and was the first Australian Labor Party leader to win a majority in the Victorian Legislative Assembly. He was the only premier of Victoria whose son also served as premier.-Early life:Cain was born, one of 18...
and future Prime Minister of Australia
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
Robert Menzies
Robert Menzies
Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, , Australian politician, was the 12th and longest-serving Prime Minister of Australia....
.
Harold Clapp famously quipped that "The railway is ninety-five percent men and five percent iron." He was possessed of a remarkable memory and learnt the names and faces of many thousands of railway employees. He regarded stationmasters, who dealt with the public at many levels, as "his front line soldiers". Although his approach to industrial relations has been judged as paternalistic
Paternalism
Paternalism refers to attitudes or states of affairs that exemplify a traditional relationship between father and child. Two conditions of paternalism are usually identified: interference with liberty and a beneficent intention towards those whose liberty is interfered with...
, his concern for workers' conditions was genuine and he was personally responsible for improvements such as better sanitation facilities and the provision of decent cafeterias at Newport Workshops.
Harold Clapp's fastidiousness for cleanliness was legendary. He was reputed to polish his shoes up to eight times a day, was renowned for running a finger along high shelves of country railway stations checking for dust, and earned the nickname "Clever Mary", after a popular brand of household cleaning product of the time.
Clapp's cleanliness was matched by his punctuality, a quality he expected in his employees and in his railway. Improvements in service reliability earned the ultimate compliment by way of the following complaint published in a Melbourne newspaper: "Mr Clapp's fiendish efficiency means that we have lost another excuse for being late for work in the mornings."
The "Reso" and Better Farming Trains
Clapp was notable for his support and assistance to the farming sector. This reflected not only a desire to boost rail traffic through increased farm production and customer demand, but also a belief that the role and social responsibilities of the Victorian Railways as an organisation went far greater than simply the provision of transport. To this end, he introduced two special trains with the aim of developing the rural economy of Victoria, the Better Farming Train and the Reso train (for Victorian National Resources Development). These trains served to link up businessmen with primary producers and develop entrepreneurial relationships, as well as educate farmers on the latest developments and best practices in agricultural science.Motive power improvements
Victorian Railways C class
The C class was a mainline goods locomotive of the 2-8-0 'Consolidation' type that ran on the Victorian Railways between 1918 and 1962. Although its original design had some key shortcomings, a number of improvements were made over the class' long career on the VR, many of which were subsequently...
heavy goods locomotive of 1918, as well as introducing three new classes of locomotive which proved to be of highly successful design, the K class
Victorian Railways K class
The K class was a branch line steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1922 to 1979. Although its design was entirely conventional and its specifications unremarkable, the K class was in practice a remarkably versatile and dependable locomotive...
and N class
Victorian Railways N class
The N class was a branch line steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1925 to 1966. A development of the successful K class 2-8-0, it was the first VR locomotive class designed for possible conversion from 5 ft 3 in broad gauge to 4 ft 8½ in standard gauge.-History:In 1923, in...
light-lines locomotives of 1922 and 1925, and the X class
Victorian Railways X class
The X class was a mainline goods locomotive of the 2-8-2 'Mikado' type that ran on the Victorian Railways between 1929 and 1961. They were the most powerful goods locomotive on the VR until the advent of diesel-electric traction, and operated over the key Bendigo, Wodonga, and Gippsland...
heavy goods locomotive of 1929. With a large fleet of relatively new A2 class
Victorian Railways A2 class
The A2 class was an express passenger locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1907 to 1963. A highly successful design entirely the work of Victorian Railways' own design office, its long service life was repeatedly extended as economic depression and war delayed the introduction of more...
locomotives available, there was far less development of new passenger locomotives during the Clapp era. Even so, the two classes that were ordered during his time (the 3-cylinder S
Victorian Railways S class
The S class was an express passenger steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1928 to 1954. Built when the VR was at its zenith and assigned to haul premier interstate express passenger services, the S class remained the VR's most prestigious locomotive class until the advent of diesel...
and H
Victorian Railways H class
The H class was an express passenger steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1941 to 1958. Intended to eliminate the use of double heading A2 class locomotives on Overland services on the steeply graded Western line to Adelaide, wartime restrictions led to only one locomotive being built...
classes) were of unprecedented size, power and technical innovation.
As an efficiency measure, Clapp dispensed with the "Canadian Red" locomotive livery introduced by his predecessor Sir Thomas Tait, replacing it with a plain black livery that required less cleaning. In other key developments that drew on his US railroad experience, he oversaw the introduction of electric lighting on VR locomotives and the fitting of auto-couplers.
Clapp also oversaw the introduction of important innovations in alternative motive power. These included the E class
Victorian Railways E class (electric)
The Victorian Railways E class was a class of electric locomotive that ran on the Victorian Railways from 1923 until 1984. Introduced shortly after the electrification of the suburban rail system in Melbourne, Australia, and based on the same electrical and traction equipment as Melbourne's early...
electric suburban goods locomotives and the introduction of rail motor
Diesel Electric railmotor (VR)
The Diesel Electric Rail Motor was a railmotor operated by the Victorian Railways of Australia.-History:...
s to provide faster, more cost effective services than steam locomotives.
Improved timetables
Clapp focussed on accelerating timetables, in many cases achieving considerable savings (and even more considerable favourable publicity for Victorian Railways) simply through better utilisation of existing technology. He introduced Victoria's first "named train", the Geelong Flier in May 1926, which cut the journey time between MelbourneMelbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
and Geelong to just one hour, using existing rolling stock hauled by an A2 class
Victorian Railways A2 class
The A2 class was an express passenger locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1907 to 1963. A highly successful design entirely the work of Victorian Railways' own design office, its long service life was repeatedly extended as economic depression and war delayed the introduction of more...
locomotive of 1907 design. In 1935 Clapp raised the maximum line speed limit on Victorian Railways from 60 to 70 mph (96 to 112 km/h) and the Flier subsequently ran to Geelong on a 55 minute timetable. The public relations success of the Flier was reflected by the train's name entering the local lexicon as a metaphor for speed; former Geelong Football Club
Geelong Football Club
The Geelong Football Club, nicknamed The Cats, is a professional Australian rules football club, named after and based in the city of Geelong, playing in the Australian Football League . The club has been the VFL/AFL premiers nine times, with a record equalling 3 in the AFL era. Geelong has also...
player Bob Davis was nicknamed "The Geelong Flier"; and even in 2005 current player David Wojcinski
David Wojcinski
David "Wojo" Wojcinski is an Australian rules footballer for the Geelong Football Club in the Australian Football League .-Career:Wojcinski made his debut in 1998. He won the club's Most Improved Player award for 2004....
was said to "run like the Geelong Flier of yesteryear".
Similarly, the Adelaide Express was renamed The Overland in 1926, despite some reluctance from the South Australia
South Australia
South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...
n authorities who jointly ran the inter-capital service. Clapp oversaw the reduction in running time for the service from sixteen and a half hours in 1928 to around fourteen hours in 1938 (with the departure time changed from 4:30pm to a much more convenient 7:00pm), achieved at very moderate cost simply through the introduction of Automatic Staff Exchange equipment between Ballarat and Serviceton
Serviceton, Victoria
Serviceton is a small town in Victoria, Australia, located near the Victorian-South Australian border, 437 kilometres north-west of Melbourne. The town was named after James Service, Premier of Victoria in 1880 and from 1883-86...
to allow unimpeded progress from one track section to the next, and design improvements to the existing A2 class locomotive fleet to increase power and efficiency.
Spirit of Progress
In 1934, Clapp toured Europe and North America to investigate new developments in rail technology such as diesel locomotiveDiesel locomotive
A diesel locomotive is a type of railroad locomotive in which the prime mover is a diesel engine, a reciprocating engine operating on the Diesel cycle as invented by Dr. Rudolf Diesel...
s. On his return, he began work on his ultimate project, upgrade of the Sydney Limited service into the all-steel, all-air-conditioned, non-stop, high-speed express streamliner
Streamliner
A streamliner is a vehicle incorporating streamlining in a shape providing reduced air resistance. The term is applied to high-speed railway trainsets of the 1930s to 1950s, and to their successor "bullet trains". Less commonly, the term is applied to fully faired recumbent bicycles...
, the Spirit of Progress
Spirit of Progress
The Spirit of Progress was the premier express train passenger service on the Victorian Railways in Australia, running from Melbourne to the Victorian border, and later through to Sydney.-Route:...
.
Clapp's decision to invest considerable funds into the Spirit of Progress was based on entirely pragmatic considerations. In an age before interstate air travel was common, politicians and heads of industry rode between Australia's two largest capital cities and the national capital Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
by train. The upgrade of the service was then a smart investment in promoting the Victorian Railways brand and its reputation to the nation's most powerful and influential people.
The train was truly world class, running non-stop along its entire 190.5 mile (306.5 km) length at an average speed of 52 mph (83 km/h) between Albury and Melbourne, a speed comparable to that of the legendary Flying Scotsman
Flying Scotsman (train)
The Flying Scotsman is an express passenger train service that has been running between London and Edinburgh—the capitals of England and Scotland respectively—since 1862...
service of the London and North Eastern Railway
London and North Eastern Railway
The London and North Eastern Railway was the second-largest of the "Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain...
. Harold Clapp's personal involvement in its design and construction was all-encompassing, from the auto-couplers connecting the carriages to the Art Deco
Art Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
interior design.
Clapp's time at Victorian Railways is often viewed as being the halcyon days for the organisation. However, during Clapp's tenure the VR was already struggling to match new competition from road transport, as well as to remain profitable despite the legacy of a network of short, inefficient branch line
Branch line
A branch line is a secondary railway line which branches off a more important through route, usually a main line. A very short branch line may be called a spur line...
s built in the late nineteenth century for reasons of political expediency rather than economic merit, challenges that were to bedevil Clapp's successors. The VR only turned a profit in two of the nearly twenty years that he was at its helm.
Wartime aviation production
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
imminent, Clapp was seconded by then Prime Minister Robert Menzies to become general manager of the Aircraft Construction Branch
Government Aircraft Factories
Government Aircraft Factories was the name of an aircraft manufacturer owned by the Government of Australia based at Fishermans Bend, a suburb of Melbourne in Victoria. It had its origins in the lead-up to World War II, during which it was known as the Department of Aircraft Production...
of the Commonwealth Department of Supply and Development, overseeing the construction of Bristol Beaufort
Bristol Beaufort
The Bristol Beaufort was a British twin-engined torpedo bomber designed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, and developed from experience gained designing and building the earlier Blenheim light bomber....
bombers in Australia. He was made chairman of the new Aircraft Production Commission in March next year.
Although Beaufort bombers were advanced aluminium aircraft requiring complex and previously untried assembly processes, the first flew as early as August 1941. During 1942 they were delivered at the rate of sixteen per month and in 1943 at 29 per month. The last of 700 was delivered in August 1944, by which time production had shifted to Beaufighter fighter-bomber, of which 364 were completed by the end of the war.
Clapp was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in the 1941 New Year Honours
New Year Honours
The New Year Honours is a part of the British honours system, being a civic occasion on the New Year annually in which new members of most Commonwealth Realms honours are named. The awards are presented by the reigning monarch or head of state, currently Queen Elizabeth II...
"[f]or public services in the Commonwealth of Australia."
Commonwealth Land Transport Board
John Curtin
John Joseph Curtin , Australian politician, served as the 14th Prime Minister of Australia. Labor under Curtin formed a minority government in 1941 after the crossbench consisting of two independent MPs crossed the floor in the House of Representatives, bringing down the Coalition minority...
Government to co-ordinate Commonwealth and State road and rail transport. In 1944, he was asked to prepare a report on the standardisation of rail gauge
Rail gauge
Track gauge or rail gauge is the distance between the inner sides of the heads of the two load bearing rails that make up a single railway line. Sixty percent of the world's railways use a standard gauge of . Wider gauges are called broad gauge; smaller gauges, narrow gauge. Break-of-gauge refers...
s in Australia.
The Second World War, in generating greatly increased rail traffic through the shipment of men, munitions and supplies around the country, exposed the inefficiency of a national rail system built on several systems built to different gauges. Multiple break-of-gauge
Break-of-gauge
With railways, a break-of-gauge occurs where a line of one gauge meets a line of a different gauge. Trains and rolling stock cannot run through without some form of conversion between gauges, and freight and passengers must otherwise be transloaded...
points across the country between 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) narrow gauge
Narrow gauge
A narrow gauge railway is a railway that has a track gauge narrower than the of standard gauge railways. Most existing narrow gauge railways have gauges of between and .- Overview :...
, 4 ft 8½ in (1,435 mm) standard gauge
Standard gauge
The standard gauge is a widely-used track gauge . Approximately 60% of the world's existing railway lines are built to this gauge...
and 5 ft 3 in (1,600 mm) broad gauge
Broad gauge
Broad-gauge railways use a track gauge greater than the standard gauge of .- List :For list see: List of broad gauges, by gauge and country- History :...
compromised the ability of the railways to support the war effort and required upwards of 1,600 men at various break-of-gauge points to transfer cargo from one train to another.
Clapp submitted a national rail plan for the complete conversion of the Victorian and South Australian broad-gauge networks to standard gauge, the conversion of the Silverton Tramway
Silverton Tramway
The Silverton Tramway was an Australian long narrow gauge railway running from Cockburn on the South Australian state border to Broken Hill in New South Wales. Operating between 1888 and 1970 it served the mines of Broken Hill, and formed the link between the standard gauge New South Wales...
and south-east South Australia
South Australia
South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...
n narrow gauge lines to standard gauge, and the linking of Perth to Kalgoorlie by a new standard gauge link, at a cost of £
Australian pound
The pound was the currency of Australia from 1910 until 13 February 1966, when it was replaced by the Australian dollar. It was subdivided into 20 shillings, each of 12 pence.- Earlier Australian currencies :...
44,318,000. He further recommended and the linking of Darwin to the national network via a new standard gauge link to be built from Queensland at a cost of £10,898,000, and a new inland standard gauge link through New South Wales and Queensland, cost £21,565,000.
Parorchial state interests thwarted the plan from being adopted. New South Wales refused to ratify the agreement as only a relatively small proportion of the project cost would be spent in NSW, where almost all track was already standard gauge. South Australia objected to the Darwin link being built from Queensland rather than extending the existing Central Australia Railway link from Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
to Alice Springs.
Clapp's report was used in 1956 as a basis for further recommendations by the Government Members Rail Standardisation Committee chaired by William Wentworth, which concluded that "while there may be considerable doubts as to the justification for undertaking large-scale standardisation of Australian railways under present circumstances, there can be no doubt that the standardisation of main trunk lines is not only justified, but long over due." By 1962, Melbourne was linked to Sydney by a standard gauge link, and by 1970 the standardisation of the transcontinental link from Sydney to Perth was completed.
Another key element of Clapp's 1945 proposal was delivered, at least in part, with the standardisation of the broad gauge Crystal Brook
Crystal Brook, South Australia
Crystal Brook is a town in South Australia, named after the spring-fed creek next to which it was founded. It is north of Adelaide and in 2006 had a population of 1,185.Crystal Brook is situated on Goyder's Line near the border of two climate systems...
line connecting Adelaide to the transcontinental Sydney-Perth railway in 1982, followed by the standardisation of South Australia's non-metropolitan broad gauge network and most of the broad gauge network in western Victoria in 1995, including the main Melbourne-Adelaide railway.
Retirement and death
On 21 October 1952 he died in hospital, leaving behind his wife, two sons and a daughter. Tributes were paid by many, including then Prime Minister Robert Menzies. Journalist C. R. Bradish described him as "a remarkable man", with "sufficient power and imagination to give the Victorian Railways a reputation they had never known before".
External links
- Spirit of Progress: Australia's Wonder Train Screensound Australia archive of the launch of Spirit of Progress; Harold Clapp is seen addressing the crowd before Premier Dunstan launches the train
- "Only Ten Percent Iron": Sir Harold Winthrop Clapp A biography of Harold Clapp, written from a Christian perspective