Thomas

Thomas is a little blue tank engine who works on the North Western Railway. After helping to rescue James from a nasty

accident, Thomas was rewarded with two new coaches, Annie and Clarabel, and was given the responsibility of running the Ffarquhar Branch Line, where he works on to this day, and finally saw the world.

Personality
Thomas is a cheeky engine. He loves teasing the others, especially the bigger engines, such as Gordon and on occasion brags about his superiority, but is always brought down to earth in due course by anyone willing to correct him, especially the Fat Controller and his two coaches, Annie and Clarabel. If Thomas has one major character flaw, it is that he is forgetful and rather impatient. However, he is also cheerful, optimistic, idealistic, altruistic, kind hearted and helpful.

Basis
Thomas is based on a London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR) Class E2 0-6-0T, particularly the second batch of locomotives built with extended side-tanks. These engines were built by Brighton Works between 1913-1916 to replace the ageing Stroudley E1 class and were primarily used for heavy shunting and short-distance goods trains in the London area and on the south coast. During their final working years, the E2 class worked as shunting engines at Southampton Docks alongside the USATC S100 Tank Engines (Rosie's basis), until they were replaced by the BR Class 07 diesel shunters (Salty's basis). All of the E2s were scrapped, with none surviving into preservation (except for Thomas). Despite this, there are plans to build the lone surviving member of the E2 class, #110, with a larger bunker and blue livery not unlike Thomas's own.

Thomas has several major differences from the original E2 class. He is much shorter in length than his original basis (making his water tanks shorter as well), he has two extra windows on the sides of his cab, he doesn't have the ladders near his front buffer beam, his bunker is notably longer and he has wheel splashers, something the original E2 class lacked.

Livery
Thomas is painted in NWR bright blue with red and yellow lining. His number 1 is painted on the sides of his tanks in yellow with red lining and the lining around his cab windows is yellow. Before he came to Sodor, he was painted grey with black lining and the letters LBSC and the number 75 on his sides.

Trivia

 * The Number of Thomas, before he came to Sodor is a Reference to the 75th Anniversary of The Railway Series that was in 2020.
 * The livery is a Reference to the Fan Character Timothy the Ghost Engine.