The Midland Railway crest

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THE MIDLAND RAILWAY ASSEMBLAGE TRAILS
"The Family Trail"
Stop Four: The Lithographic printing block

Don’t miss a walk out onto the Flight Deck before heading through the arch and bearing left into Ceramics.

A very large rectangular block of limestone which is white nad highly polished but has printing on its face

Stop 4

Where: E21 orange

What: Lithographic printing block

Material: Limestone

Why: One of these blocks of limestone was used by Bemrose & Son, who were printers in Derby, to produce Midland Railway “distance diagrams” by a process called Lithography. Wikipedia has a great explanation of how that works. These examples spent many years as a garden path in Little Eaton before being saved! An example of what this block produced is shown below.

Ref: We will have to come back to you on that one 😳

A Midland Railway Distance Diagram - Sheet 10C