About the TrustContact us | Information packs (press and education)
Michael Palin established his reputation with Monty Python's Flying Circus and Ripping Yarns. His work also includes several films with Monty Python, as well as The Missionary, A Private Function, American Friends, and as the hapless Ken in A Fish Called Wanda. His television credits include two films for the BBC's Great Railway Journeys, the plays East of Ipswich, Number 29, and Alan Bleasdale's GBH.
He has written books to accompany his seven travel series, Around the World in 80 Days, Pole to Pole, Full Circle, Hemingway Adventure, Sahara, Himalaya and New Europe.
In 2006 he published the first volume of his diaries, 1969-1979: The Python Years. He lives in North London.
Sir William McAlpine, 6th Baronet, is Chairman of the Railway Heritage Trust. Perhaps best known as the former Director of the Sir Robert McAlpine construction company, Sir William is also an avid railway enthusiast. In the 1970s, he rescued the famous Flying Scotsman locomotive from creditors in America, bringing it back to Britain to be restored. He now has his own railway, complete with station, in his garden in Buckinghamshire.
Sir William is also President of Fairbridge, a charity helping young people to turn their lives around.
Dan Cruickshank is an architectural historian whose activities include writing, teaching, campaigning and TV presenting. In 1994, while making the television programme One Foot In The Past, Dan discovered that much of the stone from the legendary Euston Arch survived at the bottom of the Prescott Channel. He then co-founded the Euston Arch Trust with a group of architects and historians, to see the Arch rebuilt using as many of the original stones as possible. Programmes Dan has presented for BBC television include Britain’s Best Buildings, Egyptian Journeys, Around the World in Eighty Treasures and Adventures in Architecture. He is a founder Trustee of SAVE Britain's Heritage, a Director of the Spitalfields Trust and a Patron of the initiative to reinvigorate the Bishopsgate Institute. Dan is also a visiting Professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Sheffield. His publications include Life in the Georgian City (1990) and a study of The Royal Hospital, Chelsea (2003).
Gavin Stamp is an architectural historian and writer. Born the year the railways were nationalised, he has always had a particular interest in the history of the most civilised form of transport and its architecture; his recent television series, Orient Express, took him by railway from London to Istanbul. He joined the Victorian Society in 1966 when St Pancras was threatened with demolition. He has written about the architecture of Edwin Lutyens, Alexander 'Greek' Thomson and the Gilbert Scott dynasty, as well as about the earliest photographs of London and telephone boxes. He is pleased to find that his great-uncle, as chairman of the London Midland & Scottish Railway, agreed with the Georgian Group that the Euston 'Arch' could be rebuilt on the Euston Road when the station was proposed for rebuilding in 1938.
William Palin is Secretary of SAVE Britain's Heritage, which campaigns to protect threatened historic buildings. From 2000 to 2007 he was Assistant Curator of Sir John Soane's Museum, where he organised 25 exhibitions including, in 2006, 'First & Last Loves: John Betjeman and Architecture' which featured the Euston Arch campaign. William has also lectured widely on 18th and 19th century art and architecture and is a contributor to Country Life magazine.
Basil Comely is a television producer, specialising in arts programmes. After joining the BBC in 1992, he became series editor on the long-running heritage series One Foot In The Past with Kirsty Wark and also made Taboo with Joan Bakewell. He has since made a number of series with Dan Cruickshank, including Britain's Best Buildings, Adventures in Architecture and Around the World in Eighty Treasures. As editor of Omnibus, Basil made award-winning films about Anthony Hopkins, JK Rowling, Placido Domingo and others. Recent series include Simon Schama's Power Of Art, Francesco's Mediterranean Voyages and Saving Britain's Past.
Tim is a PhD student in international relations at the London School of Economics and also works in the House of Lords. Originally from Crewe, Cheshire, he now lives near Russell Square and his journeys home to the north of England are always blighted by having to use Euston Station.
David is a recent graduate of University College London and is now working in the field of transport consultancy for a leading engineering firm. Originally from Durham, he now lives in Camden Town and enjoys the commute to work every day as he has long held a passionate interest for anything transport related.
Paul is a descendent of Philip Hardwick, architect of the Euston Arch. He lives and works in the capital and is a Blue Badge Guide for London.
As Secretary, Robert is responsible for the day-to-day running of the Trust. As an architectural historian, Robert has curated exhibitions for Sir John Soane's Museum and SAVE Britain's Heritage. He is completing a PhD thesis at the Courtauld Institute about the architecture of the Inns of Court.
Originally from Leeds, Eva is a graduate of LSE and University College London and currently works for a sustainable buliding and construction organisation.
Contact: evawai@gmail.com
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