A portrait of John Anderson (1830-1911) secretary of the Callander & Oban Railway Co, taken by Duncan Brown in 1865.
John Anderson had been the assistant to the General Manager of the Edinburgh & Glasgow Railway Co until September 1865, when he became Secretary of the Callander & Oban Railway Co with a small office in Dundas Street. Work on the construction of the new railway began in 1866 and the line was completed to Killin in 1870, to Tyndrum in 1873 and to Oban in 1880. Anderson moved his office to Oban, where he became company secretary and traffic manager.
The C&OR has been called "John Anderson's Railway" and it is unlikely it would have been built or would have survived without his tireless efforts in raising capital and promoting and managing the business. He worked for the company until he retired in 1907 to live in Westbourne Gardens in the West End. He was buried in Glasgow.
The section of the railway from Crianlarich to Oban remains open in 2004. The successor to "Anderson's Piano," the steel wire fence and warning system built at his suggestion to protect the line from rock falls, remains in place in the Pass of Brander.
Duncan Brown (1819-1897) was a talented amateur photographer whose work documents aspects of Glasgow life from the 1850s until the 1890s.
Reference: 197
Reproduced with the permission of Glasgow School of Art Archives
Keywords:
Anderson's Piano, Callander & Oban Railway Co, portraits, railway company secretaries, railways, traffic managers
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