Oswald Stevens Nock,B. Sc.,DIC,C. Eng,M.I.C.E.,M.I.Mech.E.,M.I.Loco.E.,[1] (21 January 1905 – 29 September 1994), nicknamedOssie, was a Britishrailway signal engineer and senior manager at theWestinghouse company; he is well known for his prodigious output of popularist publications onrailway subjects, including over 100 books, as well as many more technical works on locomotive performance.
He authored articles on railway signalling and locomotive performance forThe Engineer researched duringWorld War II, and from 1958 to 1980 he succeededCecil J. Allen as the author of the "British locomotive practice and performance" series published inThe Railway Magazine.
Oswald Stevens Nock was born 21 January 1905 inSutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, the son of a bank employee, Samuel James Nock, and a schoolteacher Rose Amy née Stevens. In early childhood Nock's father became manager of a bank branch inReading; O.S. Nock was subsequently educated at Marlborough House, andReading School. After the family moved toBarrow in Furness in 1916 he became a boarder atGiggleswick School. In 1921 he enrolled at theCity and Guilds Engineering College, in London,[2] and obtained a degree in engineering in 1924, and joined theWestinghouse Brake and Signal Company in 1925.[3]
Recession during the 1930s (seeGreat Depression in the United Kingdom) led Nock to seek other forms of income, and after having taken acorrespondence course injournalism, began to submit articles to magazines.[4][5] His first submission was a technical paper on railways submitted to theInstitution of Mechanical Engineers.[6] In 1932 he had his first works accepted for publication: the first was an article "Carlisle, a Station of Changes" published in January 1932 inThe Railway Magazine,[4][5] also in 1932 theLondon Evening News bought and published an article written as part of his journalism correspondence course: "Hyde Park's ghost trains";[7] Due to hismoonlighting as a journalist, he published underpseudonyms including "C.K.S", "C.K. Stevens" or "Railway Engineer".[4][5]
In his early writing career Nock also had published photographic articles on landscapes and regions, published by non-railway publications.[4][5] A commission forThe Star newspaper enabled him to ride on the footplate of aLMS express locomotive in 1934, subsequently he regularly submitted information on locomotive performance toThe Railway Magazine.[7]
Nock married Olivia Hattie née Ravenall (1913–1987) in 1937.[8] He had met her in King's Cross railway station where she was assistant manageress of the Georgian Tea Rooms.[9] By 1939 Nock was successful as a both a popular and technical railway author – he received a commission byThe Engineer at the beginning of theSecond World War to produce a series of articles onrailway signalling, and on locomotive performance under wartime conditions.[8]
After World War II Nock rose through the Westinghouse organisation to become chief brake draughtsman (1945), four years later chief draughtsman; during theBritish Rail modernisation plan (1955) Nock managed the expansion of the company's drawing office, and in 1957 became the company'schief mechanical engineer.[10] Nock's first published book wasLocomotives of Sir Nigel Gresley published 1945, and based on an earlier series of ten articles inThe Railway Magazine;[6] he became a regular author of publishersDavid and Charles andIan Allan in the post war boom, publishing on average two books per year whilst working at Westinghouse.[11] In 1959 he took over the writing of the "British locomotive practice and performance" reports forThe Railway Magazine fromCecil J. Allen, publishing 264 articles between then and 1980.[7]
In 1967 he was a passenger on a train involved in a derailment nearDidcot in which one person was killed. The carriage where he was sitting overturned, but he escaped without injury, and later wrote of his experience in his bookHistoric Railway Disasters. He had previously seen the aftermath of another fatal railway accident at Reading in 1914 as a schoolboy.[12]
In 1969 Nock became president of theInstitution of Railway Signal Engineers (IRSE).[13] After retiring in 1970 his output rose to five books per year, including a three volume work on 20th century British locomotives, and eight volumes on the railways of regions of the world.[6]
In addition to his interests in all things railway, Nock's interests included photography,[14] painting,[15] as well asrailway modelling.[16]
His wife Olivia died in 1987.[17] He died 21 September 1994.
Nock authored more than 140 books and 1000 magazine articles, although some of the work represented duplication from his own oeuvre,[18] as well as containing repetition or padding within the text.[19] Much of his work showed a bias towards locomotive performance issues;[20] his most authoritative work was on that subject and on signalling.[18] As a writer his output is considered accessible, uncontroversial, and empathic to the subject he wrote upon,[20] and rich in personal anecdotes,[21][22] though some feel his historical work and research was weak.[21]
His better writing has been highly praised:
... it becomes clear how a good a writer he was – clear, straightforward sentences coupled with the ability to explain technical matters in simple terms.
^abJones 2012, quote "He rarely noted sources, and tended to work on thin foundations, making maximum use of personal anecdotes [...] The few works which were compiled by him as continuations of earlier works are seldom as thorough as their predecessors"
^Vanns 2004, para.8 quote: "If [his books] had faults—repetition and a bias towards locomotive performance [..] arose because the author was an enthusiast who infused all his texts with his own experience. His work was always accessible and engaging."
^Jones 2012, quoting Michael Rutherford in Backtrack 12,222
