An Early Steam Vehicle, The Pope Mobile & The Mystery of the Leyland Ladies

SPEAKER_01 0:00 Leyland in the north of England is well known for its trucks, and here at the British Commercial Vehicle Museum, they celebrate the history of Leyland Motors. From the Poatmobile to the first steam-powered road vehicle, it is all inside this museum, and I'm here to join Keith and Dave, volunteers at the museum, to find out about the incredible history and the stories behind these vehicles. I'm Molly from what we did before. Come inside with me. Okay, Keith, tell me uh a little bit about this incredible machine.

SPEAKER_00 0:34 This is incredible, isn't it? It's um was built in 1803 by a guy called Trevitic, who was a Cornish engineer. Right. Um, working obviously around the mines. Um the first man to actually build high-pressure steam boilers. And uh James Watt, who was the steam man at the time, was very much against high pressure steam because he said it will blow up, it will kill people. Which, to be fair, it did a little bit. Oh, it did.

SPEAKER_01 1:03 So James Watt was what his um steam was.

SPEAKER_00 1:06 His steam was atmosphere. He mainly used atmospheric, so he was working mainly with vacuum. So Trevitic came up with the idea of using um high pressure steam, high pressure in terms of 100 psi, which isn't very high pressure. Using the same boiler that more or less is on this, bolted to a floor and driving a pump. Then he had the bright idea of if we put wheels on this, so it became the first rail engine, high-pressure steam. If it wasn't for Trevitic, we wouldn't have had the steam industry at all. And as far as we know, this is his second, although it's a replica, it's it was his Travithic's second-wheeled vehicle in 1803. And you can see it's crazy, it's a crazy machine. Yeah, it sits eight people who all get seasick because the suspension is horrible. I'm only just touching that.

SPEAKER_01 2:09 So you've got basically it's on a very large raised platform. So this the whole mechanics underneath it, these massive wheels at the back, and you've got this smaller wheel at the front. Why was it raised so much? Was this so that the steam power could be fitted onto the back?

SPEAKER_00 2:27 This is you have to remember, this is somebody's first idea on how to put something on the road. Within two years, things were changing. But Trevisik came up with the first idea, which seems absolutely mad now.

SPEAKER_01 2:42 Yeah. Um and this was to cart people around.

SPEAKER_00 2:45 Um the boilers on the back, and the man who stood on a platform at the back with a bucket of coal. Feed in the boiler. Honestly, we've got a bucket of coal.

SPEAKER_01 2:57 So he would have just stood on that platform the whole time.

SPEAKER_00 3:00 Platform on the back, yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:01 Oh right, just shoveling the coal in. Would it have required constant work from the person on the back?

SPEAKER_00 3:08 Pretty well. Yes. Uh it's the same as if we've uh I was talking to um an ex-steam train driver who were working at something like 250 psi, pounds per square inch. They, I mean 126 miles an hour is the record. Yes, it produces a lot of power. Yeah. You can pull a train at 100 miles an hour, but you've got to start somewhere.

SPEAKER_01 3:31 Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:32 And this is 90 years in front of all the other steam machines that we've got in the in the museum. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 3:39 So this is some you can sort of imagine this as like the sort of grandfather of of the car in a way.

SPEAKER_00 3:45 In a way, yeah. This uh or even the coach, the bus. It was called a steam coach.

SPEAKER_01 3:50 Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:52 Uh and it actually did 10 miles with eight people in um through London. And I guess they were pretty seasick because I sat in there and it's horrible.

SPEAKER_01 4:00 Yeah, so right now it's so it's on on some sort of suspension so it can sort of gently rock, which sounds absolutely disgusting. Uh, I get seasick very easily, so I think I would go green very quickly. Um, why why is it on this suspension?

SPEAKER_00 4:14 Because I guess the roads were pretty bad at the time. And when you've got wooden wheels with steel tires and all that clunky great machinery, you're gonna need some sort of idea of comfort. And everything was new. You know, that this was the sort of suspension you saw on coaches um of the time.

SPEAKER_01 4:33 And this is and coaches beforehand were just horse-drawn.

SPEAKER_00 4:36 And you're putting your people instead of being at ground level, they're six foot, seven foot in the air.

SPEAKER_01 4:41 I I guess um may you know this this makes a lot more sense when you think about a horse-drawn coach. Yeah. Um, it would have been raised up, it wouldn't have been as close to the ground. But it goes. And so it's like a natural evolution of that.

SPEAKER_00 4:54 But because the machinery he drove, he designed, then had to have the carriage higher.

SPEAKER_01 5:00 Yes.

SPEAKER_00 5:01 But it was a first attempt.

SPEAKER_01 5:03 Did it did it go fast?

SPEAKER_00 5:05 I think between five and nine miles an hour.

SPEAKER_01 5:09 You may as well walk at that point.

SPEAKER_00 5:11 We'll take a horse.

SPEAKER_01 5:13 We'll take a horse, yeah. Um, but no horse was involved in this, so that's no horse is involved, no.

SPEAKER_00 5:18 But the steering is absolutely direct.

SPEAKER_01 5:20 Oh, right, so you've just got one big lever.

SPEAKER_00 5:23 One big lever to steer with. To steer with.

SPEAKER_01 5:25 So you would I couldn't be very precise with that. Would it have been practical at the time of its invention, do you think? Like practically usable? No. No.

SPEAKER_00 5:35 To be honest, no. A Trevetic went on to design other vehicles and did all sorts of stuff with steam and died penniless in London. Yeah, it cost him everything he got. Um, he was known as the cornest giant because he was six foot two. So not much of a giant by our standards.

SPEAKER_01 5:54 No, but six foot two back then would have been massive. Penniless, like did his were his inventions just all kind of random and didn't and and didn't work all.

SPEAKER_00 6:06 I think to a certain extent, and I think the other thing is that other people took his ideas and made them better.

SPEAKER_01 6:12 And do you have any accounts of of where um you know what Trivovic did did sort of just blow up and and and cause chaos?

SPEAKER_00 6:21 There was a story that one of his vehicles um the weather was horrible, so they pulled into a pub and the fi left the fire on. And the fire boil boiled all the all the water off and then it blew up.

SPEAKER_01 6:36 Well, that's the um easy mistake to make.

SPEAKER_00 6:41 I'm not sure if it was this one or not.

SPEAKER_01 6:43 Quite a deadly mistake to make, yeah. So, Dave, we're you're kind of the master of the archives here at the uh commercial vehicle museum, and we are standing in front of the doors to the archives now. There is a wonderful story of the Leyland ladies that I would love to talk to you about. So, inside the archive room, um we have a wall, well, walls adorned with images of the Leyland ladies. Uh these beautiful images of various women throughout the years. Um, tell me the the story and the mystery of the Leyland ladies.

SPEAKER_02 8:18 It's the story. Which is your favourite subject of the museum, apparently.

SPEAKER_01 8:23 Allegedly. I'm obsessed with the Leyland ladies.

SPEAKER_02 8:26 The story begins in 1929. Arthur Walesby Windsor, who was the uh sales manager at the time at Leyland, he came up with the idea of producing a calendar, a very tasteful calendar, not like the Preli calendar. And he came up the idea of producing a calendar to supply to uh agents, to all and these these went worldwide. And this was the very, very first one. There were six different artists used over the period. And these were J.J. Frank was the very first to be produced from 1930 to 1938. And you can see on some of these that some have got prints and some of the original oils. Each artist painted between five or six different uh paintings of ladies. These were then presented to the directors of the day, and they selected one to be used for that year. Only one because there wasn't one for every month. It was just on the front cover, and there was little tear-offs for the day for the days of the month. So that's the story, and this is the very, very first one, a J. J. French. Joseph Jesse French. So this is the story. Looks a bit of a character, doesn't he? And he was a commercial artist, and he also worked for W D and H.O. Wills, very big tobaccanist companies. And he painted this one on the cigarette packet of Capstan. I'm familiar with the film. What's capstan? Capstan. There was Capstan full strength as well. A very, very strong. You got a shot.

SPEAKER_01 10:13 I didn't chip in rough water idea instead of a rough water instead of a long with the water.

SPEAKER_02 10:17 Well, he was a nautical person, that's why he came up with that particular. So that's the only one we can put a bit of history to. The others we know very, very little. We've tried to con well, I've tried to contact. I've been studying these for about ten years trying to get information. Ten years, well. We've been trying to make contact to get more information.

SPEAKER_01 10:40 So what what don't you know? So you don't all of these um beneath uh the images, there's a date listed, there's JJ French's name, or whoever it was who was Lambert. Walter Lambert, but also model unknown on every single one of them, is that right? Except Ah, the 1938.

SPEAKER_02 11:01 1938, Hilda Lambert's, and that is when Walter Lambert took over. And he painted the most I think he painted in the region of about 24 of them uh over the years. And he painted his wife. Now he alleged it is documented, if you go on a search engine, that he used them on some of the other ladies. But that is not the case, apparently. It is not the case because uh I've done research into this. And it was when I I worked for Leyland for 40 years, and it was rounded about at the time that they were all employed by Leyland, there were secretaries, etc. But apparently it is not the case.

SPEAKER_01 11:48 Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:48 We have no divinity proof. But a lady came in a few years ago, and 1964, over there, she said, I knew that lady, she actually worked at Leyland Motors. Uh I'll go home, find out her name and get back to you. She never got back to us. When was that? That was a few years ago. It was when he spoke to one of my colleagues. He never got the name of the lady who went away, so we couldn't contact her again. So whether she was I don't, we don't know. We don't it's a bit unfortunate.

SPEAKER_01 12:22 It seems quite unlikely that um these women who who all look like models um were just uh employees of Leyland Motors at the time, right?

SPEAKER_02 12:32 Well remember that's artistic license. That's true. It's artistic license, a few dabs here and a defect. I wouldn't need any if I was.

SPEAKER_01 12:41 Obviously, yeah, yeah, yeah. Where's your picture?

SPEAKER_02 12:43 So he would we can only assume that they used model agencies of the time. It'd ring up, I want a blonde lady, I want a brunette. But that is as far as we've got. And I've tried to contact relatives of all these artists to see if they've got any records, perhaps, and kept names of you would think if he'd used a lady for he he would have kept a record of the name and where she where he got it from, records, archives. But I've come up against a blank wall. So I've got no we cannot, we can only put the name to Hilda Lambert, who was the wife of Walter Lambert.

SPEAKER_01 13:20 Do you think you'll ever solve the mystery of the ladies?

SPEAKER_02 13:24 Who knows? Who knows? Don't leave us there on a term.

SPEAKER_01 13:28 Well, we've been flashing um images of the ladies during this conversation. Um, and if our audience has any idea, uh it maybe maybe there's somebody out there uh on YouTube on Spotify, can they contact you?

SPEAKER_02 13:42 If we've we've put this on social media several times and asked people if they've any knowledge about the whereabouts, whether some of them are still some of them in the 70s or 80s, obviously, uh, they can put names to them. We've asked several times, but we've never had one response yet.

SPEAKER_01 14:02 Ah, okay. Well maybe, maybe we can shift the shift it and and and someone will sort of know every single one of them. Oh Dave, thank you very much for sharing the uh story of the mystery of the Laneland Ladies.

SPEAKER_02 14:15 Okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:16 So if you think you know who any of these ladies are, please do contact Dave Bartler in the Archives Department at the British Commercial Vehicle Museum. I'm sure after 10 years of research, he would love to hear from you. So, Dave, we are standing in front of an incredible vehicle. This is not what I expected when I heard the word Pope Mobile. Um, in my mind, I expected some sort of luxury, I don't know, limousine or something. This is kind of cooler in a way. Um, tell me a little bit about the the Pope Mobile and why have you got it?

SPEAKER_02 14:52 It was built, there were two of these actually built one for this country and one for the island for the Pope's visit in 1982.

SPEAKER_01 15:01 Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:02 Both of them were built by Leyland, and this is the only remaining one. The other one it was used for uh, I don't know, stag parties, etc. So I think it's gone to the happy hunting grounds.

SPEAKER_01 15:14 But this removes it's been used to death, that one, that's it. Yeah, that's been used to death, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:19 And abused as well, I presume, if it's been used for stag party.

SPEAKER_01 15:23 So it is quite a beast, and I suppose it kind of has to be because well the Pope needs to be high up, he needs to be seen.

SPEAKER_02 15:31 It was made high up so he could when he he we he toured in Liverpool basically and Manchester, and he could wave to all the crows and bless them as he was passing. The papal blessing, basically.

SPEAKER_01 15:42 Yeah. And this glass that he was behind, this is bulletproof, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 15:47 Yes, it's all bulletproof on all the vehicles. Yes, it is, is a substantial vehicle, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:52 So, Dave, it would be fantastic to just have a quick look around and have a look at some of the features of the Pope Mobile and maybe sit where the Pope may have sat. So should we have a look around? Yeah. And give a papal wave. Yeah. So the first thing I I I notice immediately is the um very strange-looking, quite uncomfortable seat. So this is where the Pope would have sat.

SPEAKER_02 16:14 Mainly he was stood up and he was waiting and giving papal blessings to the people who were the town of the city that he was visiting. I think it was mainly Liverpool and Manchester. So he would have sat here just to have five minutes of rest, basically.

SPEAKER_01 16:31 So this visit to Liverpool and to Manchester, what wh why did it happen? Why was it specifically dedicated?

SPEAKER_02 16:36 Because it was the first visit by a pope to this country.