My grandfather, Roger Bugler, who has died aged 98, was an engineer and lifelong railway enthusiast. Although his career was in locomotive traction motor manufacture and sales, he was also interested in railway signalling and safety.
Roger was born in Kingsbridge, Devon, to Albert Bugler, a Lloyd’s bank manager, and Isabel (nee Harris), a homemaker. In 1942, after attending Clifton college in Bristol, he went to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, to study engineering. He expected to join the army after graduating but was instead seconded to industry and became a traction engineer. He had a single employer throughout his career, though it changed names: BTH (British Thomson-Houston), then AEI (Associated Electrical Industries), then GEC (the General Electric Company). Until 1960 he worked in Rugby, thereafter at Trafford Park, Manchester, until his retirement in 1989.
