Henry

“"First the rain, then an elephant. Whatever will you be afraid of next?"”

― Gordon, "Henry and the Elephant", fourth season

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Henry is #3 on the North Western Railway.

Bio

Henry was built in 1898, in 1898 plans were stolen from Sir Nigel Gresley and whoever build the engine was glad to sell it to Sir Topham Hatt in 1922. Henry was vain at first and once refused to move from a tunnel, citing that his paintwork would be spoilt by the rain. After several attempts to move him failed, he was bricked up in the tunnel until Gordon broke down while pulling the Express.

Following this incident, Henry was repainted in blue but later green again, he soon started to develop problems steaming again though. This was attributed to his firebox's small size and Henry began using Welsh coal; but in 1950 Henry had a collision with a goods train and was sent to Crewe to be rebuilt. Henry was rebuilt into a Stanier 5MT, A.K.A 'The Black Five' Sir Topham Hatt has cconnestions with Sir Wiliam Stanier, this may be the reason he managed to get henry rebuilt North Western Railway.

Persona

Henry is generally well-behaved, but he is occasionally arrogant and vain. Henry is at heart a hard worker, but his frequent bouts of illness hinder his work.

Appearances

Henry's Railway Series appearances are listed below, in chronological order:

• "The Three Railway Engines"
• "Thomas the Tank Engine" (non-speaking role)
• "James the Red Engine" (non-speaking role)
• "Tank Engine Thomas Again"
• "Troublesome Engines"
• "Henry the Green Engine"
• "Gordon the Big Engine"
• "Edward the Blue Engine"
• "Four Little Engines"
• "Percy the Small Engine" (non-speaking role)
• "The Eight Famous Engines"
• "Duck and the Diesel Engine"
• "The Little Old Engine" (cameo)
• "The Twin Engines"
• "Stepney the "Bluebell" Engine"
• "Main Line Engines"
• "Small Railway Engines" (mentioned)
• "Enterprising Engines"
• "Oliver the Western Engine"
• "Really Useful Engines"
• "James and the Diesel Engines"
• "Great Little Engines" (mentioned)
• "More About Thomas the Tank Engine"
• "Gordon the High-Speed Engine"
• "Thomas and the Great Railway Show"
• "Thomas Comes Home"
• "Henry and the Express"
• "Thomas and the Fat Controller's Engines"

Henry has appeared in every season of the television series.

Basis

Henry is based on LMS Stanier 5MT "Black Five" 4-6-0. He has a low capacity Fowler tender, three splashers, a square Belpaire Firebox and tapered boiler, and usually dome and top feed. He was based on a cross between a GCR C1 and LNER A3 on a 4-6-0 wheel arrangement with a unique retractable rear pony truck, a curve in the running boards similar to an LNER Class A1/A3, a cutoff third splasher flush with a firebox cut down flush with the running boards, and a curved down footplate at front. In the Railway Series, he has two cab windows on each side and no splashers, while in the television series, he has one cab window on each side and three splashers.

Livery

Henry is always painted NWR green with red and yellow lining, except from the end of The Three Railway Engines to the beginning of Troublesome Engines, when he was painted blue with red lining and a brass funnel, and Henry Sees Red, when he was painted all-over fiery red including his smokebox and boiler, with dark red lining on his cab and a green tender and top.

They're two, they're four, they're six, they're seven . . . seven?

The Reverend W. Awdry had a great deal of trouble with Henry. He was unhappy with C. Reginald Dalby's illustrations of him: he looked almost identical to Gordon, more so while he was painted blue - in one illustration in "Tank Engine Thomas Again" Henry looked completely identical to Gordon, but this was passed off by explaining he needed to use Gordon's buffers while his were repaired. To make matters worse, he was illustrated inconsistently, often having several different shapes within the space of a single story - in most of Dalby's illustrations Henry was portrayed as a 4-6-0, but occasionally he became a 4-6-2 instead.

Awdry's original idea had been to write Henry out of the series, but by "Henry the Green Engine" he had decided not to, and instead had Henry involved in a serious accident, allowing him to be rebuilt into a Class 5MT. As this was a real locomotive, Dalby was thus forced to be consistent.

Is that Henry or Henry?

There is a certain amount of argument over Henry's rebuild, caused by "The Island of Sodor: Its People, History and Railways". The book was written to provide historical background to the Railway Series universe and to correct pictorial inconsistencies that had occurred in the earlier volumes. The Reverend W. Awdry claimed that the pre-rebuild and post-rebuild Henry are actually two completely separate engines, but the Railway Series show the contrary, as Henry seems familiar with events that happened before the crash. The answer could simply be that Henry's memory survived the rebuild, but as both sources can be considered equally canonical the question of whether there have been two Henrys or one will likely remain unanswered.

According to "TIOS" Henry was an experimental locomotive built from to plans stolen from Sir Nigel Gresley - the thief's name was never revealed - but the wrong plans were taken and the locomotive built was so riddled with faults that the only person who could be persuaded to buy it was the Fat Controller, who, at the time, was desperate for any locomotive he could get.

"TIOS" also featured a biography of the Fat Controller, which mentioned that he was apprenticed with Stanier at Swindon Works. It is possible that this was another piece of retcon added explain how Henry was able to be rebuilt so easily - something that even the Reverend W. Awdry admitted was "a mystery".

In "Sodor: Reading Between the Lines", Henry was said to look very much like a Stanier 5MT, which suggests that he is not totally identical to one of these engines. It is not clear why Christopher Awdry should have felt the need to contradict his father, the original author, but it could simply be a combination of copy-editing errors and publication deadlines.

Metal surgery

Although Henry was never portrayed as a 4-6-2 in the television series, major differences have been noticed between the model of Henry and the illustrations of Henry. His old shape appears to have been used as his new shape as well, as Henry's old shape appears to be identical to his newer one. The only difference appears to be the presence of a sand hatch and different firebox. This could have been done for ease of the changeover to his Black Five-esque appearance.

When the new models for the television series were made in 2000, Henry was given a cutoff splasher approximately where his old shape's tapered boiler and old cutoff splasher was; and also, if looked at closely, when Henry is wrecked, his sand hatch from his new shape is already fitted! In another continuity error, during a head-on shot after Henry has returned from his Crewe rebuild, his old shape is used.

"As black as . . . er . . . soot"

Henry was the central character of what might be the most controversial story in the history of the Railway Series. In "Henry's Sneeze", Henry got revenge on some stone-throwing boys by "sneezing" at them. Unfortunately, the boys in question were said to have been "as black as niggers" and the story was attacked in 1972. So controversial was the issue that it was reported in the national press. Awdry replied that the race relations board was being over-sensitive, which only made matters worse, as it made the public think he was a racist. To solve the problem, he changed the offending sentence to "as black as soot", which has been used in every subsequent edition of the book.

Henry was also the focus of Awdry's irritation once again in the nineties, when the third season of the television series aired. This series featured a number of episodes that had not been adapted from the Railway Series, some of which annoyed Awdry with their lack of realism. The episode that particularly irked him was "Henry's Forest".

Awdry's complaints were directed at two aspects of the episode in particular. One was that it was unrealistic to have a railway running through a forest. Britt Allcroft, the series' producer at the time, countered by claiming that she had seen a number of railways that do just that.

The other one was that Henry stopped to admire the view without alerting the signalman - a direct violation of British Railways' Rule 55. This, Awdry argued, would never be allowed to happen in real life, and would be highly unsafe.

In the fifth season episode "James and the Trouble with Trees", some trees were removed because "the Fat Controller says they're too close to the line". This is evident in the eighth season episode "Henry and the Wishing Tree", in which the trees are further back. It seems that these changes were a response to Awdry's complaints.

Henry on the big screen

Henry was voiced by Kevin Frank in "Thomas and the Magic Railroad". In the movie, Henry appeared to be American and still suffer from boiler trouble. This time, however, his sickness was cured by "Sodor Coal".

Constructive criticism

Here are some of the moments where Henry has been subjected to criticism from the others, as evidenced below:

"I don't disappear into the background like some engines I could mention. If it weren't for the noise, you'd need a yellow and black front like Mavis."

- James, "James and the Diesel Engines", page 36

" . . . he [the Fat Controller] didn't like your sneeze, I seem to remember."

- Gordon, "Gordon the High-Speed Engine", page 22

"An overhaul, is it? Sounds like you need retiring, you poor old thing."

- James, "Henry and the Express", page 34

Did you know? . . .

• Awdry's own model of Henry was as troublesome as his fictional counterpart: it never really worked properly. The model was eventually scrapped but never replaced.
• In the Railway Series, Henry's tender is unusually small for a Stanier 5MT. In the book "Sodor: Reading Between The Lines", it is explained that this is because it is a smaller tender of a type designed by Henry Fowler, which the Fat Controller prefers.
• In the 1997 "Thomas the Tank Engine Annual", Henry's driver's first name is revealed to be Ted.