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LNER/Pathe Cinema Coach. In 1942,
they were converted back to passenger
brakes. Surprisingly, they were not used
by the military for conferences and
briefings.
The 1940s saw the Southern
Railway use cinema car technology for
instruction of their staff while the
vehicles were stationary in platforms.
After Nationalisation of the
railways in 1949, British Transport
Films used two cinema coaches to tour
the national system. Each was equipped
to seat 58 and they were fitted with
16mm sound projectors fed by a mobile The butcher’s van on the ‘Tea and Sugar’ train. Image: Tim Armstrong Collection.
generator for use in sidings. (One of
these coaches was the subject of the
story in CR 49).
Passenger coaches equipped to
show films on a temporary basis were
also sometimes attached to excursion
trains in the early days of British Rail.
In parts of Australia stationary
cinema carriages were used for
instructional purposes in the 1930s (see
CR 49), but their introduction on the
line where imagination suggests that
they might have been most appreciated
- the Transcontinental Railway - seems
to have come very late.
The ‘Tea and Sugar’ train run by the
Commonwealth Railways, which
brought essentials to the fettlers and
their families in the ‘camps’ between The screen-end of the cinema car of the ‘Tea and Sugar’ train at the Port Augusta
Port Augusta and Kalgoorlie, workshops 1969. A bulge in the roof at the far end suggests modifications for the
introduced a cinema car in 1963. This projection room. A flat wagon with generator is coupled to the carriage.
was a conversion of a Victorian and Image: Rod Smith.
South Australian Railways joint-stock
first class carriage built in 1907.
Families had a long wait between
films; only seven shows were provided
a year with the program selected by the
Welfare Officer. These shows were
discontinued in 1981 or 1982. The last
‘Tea and Sugar’ train ran in 1996.
Given that the USA is looked on as
the home of cinema, and with luxury
American passenger trains covering long
distances until the 1950s, it would seem
natural that the cinema should have
become part of express -train operation
there, yet references to cinema cars in
America are few and far between.
Nowadays video has made on board
entertainment so easy. In-flight movies Inside the same cinema car. Image: Tim Armstrong Collection.
are an accepted part of plane travel and
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Rod Smith supplied more information
on interstate buses. Sweden has video-
This article is based on Movies On the about films on the Tea and Sugar train,
bar cars on some long distance trains,
Move by Alexander Mullay, published and Eric White added information
where the surroundings are akin to a
in The Railway Magazine of October about Soviet-era screenings.
cinema. It’s comfort plus, but the
2003. It is reproduced by kind Mel Elliott supplied the magazine
concept had its proving-ground in the permission of The Railway Magazine. which started the hunt for more
frozen wastes of Siberia. ★ CATHS members Tim Armstrong and information.
14 2006 CINEMARECORD