Allan Garraway

In 1950, Garraway was one of the initial group of volunteers who rescued the Talyllyn Railway. This was the first railway in the world to be run entirely by volunteers and started the railway preservation movement. The next year, he was one of the "Bristol group" of volunteers who proposed rescuing the Festiniog Railway which lay moribund about 20 miles north of the Talyllyn. By 1953, enough of the Festiniog Railway had been restored to start a public service, with the first train running on 23 July 1955.^[2]

In November 1954, Garraway was appointed the engineer of the Festiniog Railway. In June 1955, he left British Railways and became the full-time Manager and Engineer of the Festiniog. In 1958, he became the first General Manager of the revived company. He regularly drove trains on the railway until 1974, usually on the footplate of Linda. He stepped down as General Manager of the Festiniog in 1983, continuing as a consultant until 1986.^[5]

Garraway married Moira McMillan, on 23 October 1965.^[6] For a while they lived in a flat converted from an office in Porthmadog Harbour railway station, but later they moved to a bungalow in Minffordd.^[5] In 1986, the Garraways retired to Boat of Garten in Scotland.

Garraway died on 30 December 2014, three years after Moira.