Poster: London Transport at London’s service, by Misha Black and John Barker (Kraber) – 1947

Vintage Underground Railway Poster: London Transport at London’s service, by Misha Black and John Barker (Kraber) – 1947

Between 1947 and 1966, Harold Hutchinson was Head of Publicity for London Transport. He is best known for creating his own version of the London Underground in an attempt to replace the familiar Harry Beck version. Beck’s iconic map made sense of a complicated underground network comprising of 150 miles of track and 273 stations. His map ignored scale and geography and was inspired by circuit diagrams used by electrical engineers.

Hutchinson believed that he could design a superior version of the Beck diagram himself. The finished version was released in January 1960 but was not well-received. Whereas Beck’s map had, albeit with regular changes, been used for thirty years. Hutchinson’s map was replaced after just three!

Whilst his new Underground Map wasn’t a success, Hutchinson was responsible for reviving Frank Pick’s attitude towards the benefits of using tube station posters to raise public awareness and promote the Underground’s services, stations and destinations. It was Hutchinson that introduced what is now known as the ‘Pair Poster’. The idea of the pair poster was to allow a greater artistic and creative freedom on one poster and display with a complimentary poster alongside it, allowing the companies copywriters to provide the information and expand on the topic.

This London Transport At London’s Service poster was one-half of the first of the pair posters. It was illustrated by Misha Black and John Barker in 1947. It offers an aerial view over the city of London. A shape in the sky, looking like the planet Saturn or some kind of out-of-this-world spaceship is a globe representing the London Underground’s Roundel logo.

Basic versions of the logo first appeared as station name boards on Underground station platforms in 1908. These were usually a red bar and circle. The bar would have an infill of blue with the station name reversed out in white. In 1915, London Undergrounds Frank Pick commissioned the graphic designer and calligrapher Edward Johnston to redesign the image. By 1917,  Johnston’s revised logo, was very similar to the one we know today.

It is a version of this roundel that is depicted on the left-hand side half of this London Transport at London’s service poster. The roundel is being beamed down like a spotlight across the whole of London. St Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Bridge and Tower Bridge stand prominently out of the surrounding landscape. Given that the poster was published a couple of years after the world war, this image must have invoked the memory of the searchlights used extensively in London, in defense against nighttime bomber raids. In the bar across the roundel, it reads London Transport at London’s service poster.

The right-hand side of the poster provides some (genuinely interesting)facts about the Underground. The points on the poster state that London Transport is the world’s largest urban passenger transport undertaking, and that it began its operations on 1st July 1933. It mentions that “The population of the area served by London Transport is 9,500,00 – a quarter of the population of England. It goes on to explain “The London Transport system stretches from Aylesbury to Gravesend (58 miles West to East) and from Luton to Horsham (57 miles north to south). It tells that “London Transport provides passenger services over an area of 2,000 square miles and that 4,300,000,000 journeys are made annually on the London Transport system. And finally, that 11,500,000,000 miles are travelled annually by passengers on the London Transport system.

Originally these posters would have been produced as two separate posters with the intention of displaying them side by side. Our heritage-posters version on this listing includes both images on one poster. The two posters are also available on the site individually.

Our posters are carefully and professionally created from vintage originals. Whilst great care is taken in the production of these posters, we also try to maintain a vintage feel, so there may be small imperfections, fold marks, scuffs, tears or marks that were part of the original poster master. If these do appear they should be visible on the larger views of the item on this listing. The originals of many of the posters we offer can cost many thousands of pounds, so whilst these posters look great, especially framed and mounted on a wall, they are intended as fun, affordable reproductions and not intended fine art prints.

The 50x70cm version has been specially produced to be used in conjunction with Ikea’s 50x70cm Ribba picture frame which currently retails for around £12. So you can bag a print and frame for a great price.