Around the world – on steam

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Circumnavigating the world by car is believed to have been done for the first time about a century ago. This was by two Swedes in an Adler in the late 1920s. And ever since that original and rather epic drive, the list of record drives around the world has mushroomed. You will have to be really creative to find a new way of motoring around the globe if you want to make it into the world record books now. Electric vehicle, amphibious vehicle: it’s all been done.

But doing it in a steam vehicle is most certainly worthy of a mention here nevertheless, we thought. Michael List Brain was the man to do it and you can see him here departing from the 1968 London Motor Show at Earl’s Court for his Grand Global Tour. His vehicle? A 1926 Foden C-type 6-ton steam wagon named Britannia. Now, if you have ever seen a steamer make its way around a field, you must have noticed that speed isn’t its main characteristic. If you ever got behind one on a road, you probably won’t have liked it. They have the speed of a slug. The Foden C-type is believed to have been able to average 12 mph, which doesn’t even seem that bad to us. Mr List Brain must have been a very patient man nevertheless.

He calculated that the 23,000-mile trip would use up 65 tons of coal and 12,000 gallons of water. And that it would take him two years. The journey, assisted by a crew of three, would eventually take about double that – four years. But then, according to the Steam Museum near Canterbury in Kent – which has List Brain’s Foden on permanent display – ‘She travelled in places as diverse as Afghanistan, Australia, India and the United States, and she has seen the likes of everybody from Presidents to pop stars travelling in her cab.’

Any of you who actually saw it creep past on its travels somewhere between 1968 and ’72?

Words Jeroen Booij, Picture Picryl

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