Lord Ashfield: Creator of London Transport
Introduction
As the first Chairman of London Transport, Albert Henry Stanley, later Lord Ashfield, combined the discipline of commercial management with public accountability and an awareness of the social benefits of an integrated public transport system.
Beginnings
Albert Henry Knattriess was born in 1874 near Derby. The family emigrated to the USA, where they changed their name to Stanley. Albert’s father was a coach painter and had mapped out a career in the church for his young son. Albert, however, was captivated by horse trams and engineering.
Beginning his career at just 14, he began working as an odd job man and messenger at the Detroit Citizens’ Street Railway Company. Saving his earnings, he attended technical college whilst working and observing the traffic men in various departments to gain insight into the business. He soon abandoned clerical work to gain an in-depth understanding of electricity and the mechanical side of the tramway equipment. He even stayed beyond his day’s work to gain extra experience with a skilled mechanic.
Schedule for success
At the age of eighteen, a Superintendent position became available.
‘I can do the job. Give me the chance’, Stanley proclaimed.
An unlikely candidate at the time, Stanley pushed for the role and got the job preparing schedules for one of the divisions on the tramway system. By the age of 20 he oversaw the whole street railway system of Detroit.
It was during this time he learnt the importance of advertising and he developed and improved local transport enormously. Progressing at rapid speed, he soon took an opportunity in New Jersey, where a new traction system was being engineered. As General Manager, he managed nearly 1,000 miles of electric railway and 25,000 men.
Shortly after this, at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, he joined the naval reserve and was later drafted as a seaman in 1898 aboard a ship called the Yosemite. One of his jobs included diving overboard to disentangle the ship’s propellers from mines!
Stanley saves the day
With a reputation as one of the leading managers of urban transit in the United States, Stanley’s talents became well known. In 1907, the executives of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (UERL) approached him to become head of the great combine of tubes and buses. Appointed General Manager, Stanley found the company in a state of near bankruptcy. His tough and forceful leadership style was necessary to fix the situation. Stanley is said to have likened his entrance into the UERL to that of an electric eel being let loose in a tank of sleepy fish.
Heading straight for the bank, Stanley persuaded them to give the company the capital to advertise his new underground lines. Meanwhile, he gave his senior managers six months to turn the company around. Luckily, Stanley had the financial, technical and administrative brains and the enterprise to turn the situation around. His assistant Frank Pick found an affinity with publicity at this time that would have far-reaching consequences.
Stanley’s plan to effectively eliminate competition by bringing competing companies into the Group proved effective, and ultimately there was no need for the bank loan he had secured.
The UndergrounD
In 1908, the UERL expanded its compound by agreeing to market its activities jointly with the Central London Railway, the City & South London Railway, the Metropolitan, and the Great Northern & City Railway.
Stanley’s inspired management led to a unification of the various interests of the separate corporations under one adopted brand, known as the Underground Group. In 1908, the ‘UndergrounD’ appeared as a readily recognisable symbol for all Underground railways to use.
The golden age of transport in London
Stanley, of course, had help. The previous year, in 1907, he had made the impressive, demanding and uncompromising Frank Pick responsible for the Underground’s publicity.
Together, Stanley’s corporate intuition and Pick’s design vision would transform the look of London’s transport network. Pick cleared the stations of clutter, maximising space for essential signage. Now the ‘Underground’ brand could be seen as an illuminated sign, on timetables and single standard maps that included all lines.
Their ingenious ploy to promote the Underground Group as a cooperative system between private companies that were still independent operations was a success. The new company achieved considerable savings and the original three electric tubes of the UERL, referred to as the London Electric Railway, saw a huge increase in the number of passengers.
This was largely aided by the introduction of workmen’s return tickets to all stations and Stanley’s strong relationship with newspapers, who reported on the developments to the modern Underground system.
The road to success
Stanley continued to work towards an integrated transport system combining trains, buses and trams. In 1912, he negotiated the incorporation of the London General Omnibus Company (LGOC) into the Group and, seeing potential for the development of motor buses in emerging outer suburbs, he developed bus routes that linked with railway stations.
First Baron Ashfield of Southwell
Stanley’s service to the Underground Group was acknowledged with a knighthood in 1914. That year, Ashfield took his first holiday. However, this was to be cut short and he had to be smuggled from Germany in a freight train filled with soldiers to reach London the night before war was declared.
In 1916, he was appointed Director General of Mechanical Transport at the War Office. In that same year, he resigned from the Underground Group, becoming the Conservative MP for Ashton-under-Lyme and the President of the Board of Trade under Prime Minister Lloyd George’s administration.
On familiar ground, Stanley was surrounded by railway problems. He took control of the Irish railways. He also put into operation a scheme for sending rolling stock to France, managing the movement of hundreds of locomotives, thousands of wagons, and miles of rails across the English Channel. As a reward for his efforts, Stanley was created Baron Ashfield of Southwell in 1920, and was referred to from then on as Lord Ashfield.
London Passenger Transport Board
The issue of one single traffic authority to cover the whole of London was still at large. Lord Ashfield returned to the Underground Group as Managing Director in 1919 and then became Chairman in 1921.
In collaboration with the Labour Minister of Transport, Herbert Morrison, he produced an acceptable solution to the transport problem. Making his first and only speech in the House of Lords, Ashfield secured support for the state’s acquisition of the Underground Group. On 1 July 1933, the London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) became the world’s largest single passenger transport authority. It was responsible for all the capital’s bus, tram and Underground services. Additionally, despite initial hostility, the system was nationalised.
Under Ashfield’s guidance, and with the support of his deputy Frank Pick, the Board made plans to expand and develop new and existing transport systems. These included electrification of whole parts of existing lines, modernisation of the Underground and its stations, the conversion from trams to trolleybuses, the extension of the Central and Piccadilly lines and the proposed Victoria line (originally called route C).
At the time of its formation, London Transport Passenger Board employed over 70,000 staff, rising to almost 100,000 in 1947. London Transport, as it was commonly known, was considered a good employer, offering relatively high wages, staff mess rooms, sports associations (which Ashfield attended frequently) and a home to live in upon retirement.
There is no task in the world that can be really hard. Anxious, maybe, but not beyond man’s capacity, given the right conditions and willingness.
Ashfield held his position as Chairman of the LPTB until 1947, just before the British Transport Commission took over in 1948.
Ashfield was appointed a founding member and was able to contribute his great experience for just short of a year before he died in November 1948.
In remembrance of his remarkable work and personality, a memorial in his name was unveiled at the headquarters of London Transport, 55 Broadway. It reads: ‘Creator of London Transport’.
Amongst his many considerable contributions to London Transport, Ashfield held directorships and was Chairman of several other business ventures, including the Midland Bank, Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI), the British Dyestuffs Corporation, North Metropolitan Power Company, and the United Railways of the Havana (Cuba).
Ashfield’s outstanding management and directorial abilities were unparalleled. He was politically aware and a master negotiator, with a well-developed sense of timing. His ruthlessness was cloaked in charm.
He was a strong leader and a significant figure in London’s passenger transport for over 40 years. His abilities complemented those of his Vice-Chairman Frank Pick, for while Pick handled the day-to-day business of management, Ashfield could think of the wider picture unencumbered. Without Ashfield and Pick, there would be no Transport for London.
