Derby Corporation No. 1

Derby 11 at Victoria Street. M.J. O’Connor, date unknown.

Fortunately for this particular tram, the lower saloon was sold off for use as a summer house in Mickleover, where it remained for almost 30 years before being acquired by the Derby Tramway Group in 1962. The upper part was reconstructed from parts salvaged from about a dozen old tram bodies that had belonged to trams from Derby, Nottingham and Leicester.

Derby 1 at Ascot Drive bus depot. J.H. Price, 20/7/1963.

Some advertising panels that had formed part of the decency panels on the upper decks of open-topped tramcars of this type were found separately by a sharp-eyed tramway enthusiast who spotted an unusual windbreak on some nearby allotments. The truck was originally bought from Blackpool Corporation for a project to restore a Nottingham tramcar (no. 67).

Derby 1 at Plumtree goods depot. J.H. Price, 27/5/1967.

After initial restoration and display at the short-lived East Midlands Transport Museum near Nottingham, the tram itself was later acquired by the Tramway Museum Society and moved to its off-site storage facility in 1970, where it remained in store for the next 20 years, before taking its place in the then newly opened Exhibition Hall in 1991 after a cosmetic repainting.

The tram has never operated at Crich since it was originally built to the narrower four foot gauge, though when it was cosmetically restored it was re-gauged and placed on a standard gauge truck that was obtained from the ex-Blackpool “Gondola” illuminated car, which  made it possible to exhibit it together with the rest of the collection in the Great Exhibition Hall.

Derby 1’s last public appearance at Crich for a while took place on 2/5/2021 shortly before it was due to be placed in storage for the time being. Photo: Jim Dignan

Its spell in the limelight came to an end on 11th June 2021, however, at least temporarily, as the tramcar restoration programme and consequent constraints on space in the workshop necessitated a reorganisation of the contents of the Exhibition Hall.

Two Midlands tramcars, Derby 1 and Leicester 76, photographed on a rare outing together on 2/5/2021. Photo: Jim Dignan

In order to free up sufficient space for Blackpool 298 to return to the museum for its long-awaited restoration to begin, Derby 1 had to take its place in the museum’s off-site storage facility at least for the time being.  Two years later, however, its short period of exile came to an end when the tramcar returned to the workshops at Crich, where it was spruced up for a new role in a once very familiar setting.

For on 21st August it was moved to the former Victoria Ironworks foundry on Osmaston Road that had once served as a depot for Derby Corporation’s trams and trolleybuses and, more recently, as a home for the city’s Rolls Royce Heritage Centre.

Derby 1 on display at the Great Northern Classics Centre on Osmaston Road. Photo: Jim Dignan, 23/3/2024

The building is now being prepared to host an exciting new venture – “Great Northern Classics” – that will combine show-rooms for classic motor vehicles alongside workshops, commercial units and facilities for providing apprentices with valuable heritage engineering skills that might otherwise be lost.

Derby 1 is being loaned for display at the centre, where it now forms an eye-catching exhibit for visitors since the building opened to welcome visitors in spring 2024..