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It All Happens Here -- Thomas The Tank's Imaginary Island of Adventure!
Scarce early pictorial map of the imaginary island of Sodor, Wilbert Awdry's fantasy world setting for the adventures of the children's book series Thomas the Tank.
The map illustrates Thomas the Train's world, with characters arrayed in the pictorial border and details of the stories in the reference key.
This is apparently the printed version of the map of Sodor, which would go through numerous variations and incarnations of the following decades, most recently revised in 2010.
According to the website The Real Lives of Thomas the Tank Engine -- The Mapping of Sodor: http://www.sodor-island.net/railwayseries/mapsection.htm
Sodor was "discovered" in 1949, when Thomas' branch from Knapford to Ffarquhar was drawn, and the connecting line to Tidmouth.
A map of the complete island came to light around 1950.
By 1952 this was beautifully realised in a large relief map by PR Wickham, comissioned by Edmund Ward for the Rev. Awdry, now part of the "Awdry Study" at the NGRM, Tywyn.
PR Wickham faithfully built stock for the Rev's model railway and produced other plans and at least one map, such as this of Thomas' branch in 1959.
The Wickham relief map was the basis for this Edmund Ward publication of a 22" x 11½" map in 1958
Sodor is a fictional island located in the Irish Sea, just off the English mainland near Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria. It is the setting for The Railway Series books by the Rev. W. Awdry (and his son Christopher), and also for the popular television series Thomas & Friends.
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