Robert Humm & Co railway bookshop in Stamford to close as Clare and Robert retire

A business that began in the back bedroom of a flat and became Britain’s largest railway bookshop will sell its final volumes this summer.

Robert Humm & Co Transport Book Shop was started just over 50 years ago by Robert and his wife Clare, then a young couple living in Chiswick.

But as stock levels grew, and so did their daughters, the Humms moved the shop to Stamford, spending 20 years at the old Station House next to the railway station before moving it to the former Black Horse pub in Scotgate.

When they met, Robert and Clare both worked for the Ministry of Transport and shared an interest in trains and railways.

Robert had grown up in the Essex suburbs, coming into Central London on Saturdays to take part in one of the most popular pastimes of the day - trainspotting.

“Looking back to the mid-1950s when I was aged about 10, I needed something to do,” said Robert.

“But choices were more limited - there was only one TV channel, the radio and books, so we all turned to collecting something, whether that was stamps, Dinky toys, matchbox labels or the numbers on engines and carriages.

“There were tens of thousands of us trainspotters. Back then we were all at it.”

Clare too was no stranger to the hobby, often accompanying her father and brother to various platforms while they took down numbers.

For Robert, it was character-building.

“I learned more from being out trainspotting than I did at school,” he said. “I learned to travel around the country, read a complex timetable, work methodically and record accurately, plus I learned about the workings of the railways, as well as how to avoid strangers who were a bit odd.”

The enjoyment of ‘collecting’ developed into Robert’s eventual line of work.

Having joined the Ministry of Transport from school, he liked his role but not the ‘endless’ meetings and administration that went with it.

Fortunately the civil service took a relaxed attitude to people having what’s today known as a side hustle, and so in 1974 Robert and Clare, having married the previous year, started to sell books about railways.

Soon they had about 5,000 volumes, which spilled out of the back bedroom to form piles elsewhere in the flat.

It was around this time that Robert, due to attend a book auction in Leeds, bought a copy of The Railway Magazine to read on the train. Clare spotted an advert on one of its pages for the Station House in Stamford, available to rent through the British Railways Property Board.

The couple visited and decided in 1987 to make Stamford a home for their business and themselves. Daughters, Louisa and Joanna, who were soon enrolled at St Augustine’s School.

After mice were dispatched from the Station House and the roof made watertight, stock was moved by Steeles of Stamford, which would take antiques from the area to be auctioned at Sotheby’s, and return with books from the Humms’ Chiswick home.

They would be there for the next quarter of a century, with customers from around the world, including Australia, New Zealand and Canada. And while Brexit has caused a headache when selling to European customers, they have a good following in northern Europe.

“Our customers have given us years of support and some personal friendships too,” said Clare.

“We have been able to meet some very interesting people, including a great many railway engineers right through to high court judges.”

Most are, like them, collectors of books, who enjoy having a good quality home library and being knowledgeable in their subject.

Occasionally though, the wider world wants to get involved. When Michael Portillo’s Great Railway Journeys aired on the BBC, there was a sudden demand for books and timetables by Bradshaw, who was producing timetables and guides early last century. It was Robert and Clare who sold Michael the original Bradshaw’s Tourist Handbook, and they continue to sell various works by the author.

Michael made a visit to Stamford, meeting Robert and Clare at their bookshop while filming on the railway line between Oakham and Cambridge, although TV editing meant only a short part of what was filmed in the town reached the screen.

Robert and Clare are now selling off about 30,000 books, booklets, timetables and bound periodicals, with the aim of retiring later this summer.

Among Robert’s favourite books has been a pair of volumes from the mid-19th Century by JC Bourne, Drawings of the London and Birmingham Railway and The History and Description of The Great Western Railway. Beautifully kept and large in size, they were priced £7,500 for the pair.

Robert asked a more modest £12 for his least favourite, written about the 3,000km Baikal-Amur Magistral that runs from central Siberia to just shy of the Pacific coast. In a catalogue he produced, Robert wrote that the 20-year building project for the railway in a region of permafrost and mountain ranges “deserves an authoritative history”.

He added: “Sadly this is not it. The book is virtually fact-free. There is no map nor track plans, no worthwhile photos, no details of construction equipment, nothing about the major obstacles and how they were overcome… mostly it consists of scrappy tales of Communist Youth League ‘volunteers’ getting stuck in with a song on their lips to the glory of Mother Russia. The first photo is of Brezhnev addressing the Party faithful, an essential in any railway book.”

For Robert, retirement will bring a chance to spend more time writing. As well as producing well-written book catalogues, he has had a variety of articles for magazines. One of his latest pieces of research is on WHSmith railway station book stores, the first of which opened in 1848.

Clare has said she intends to “devote herself to the garden”.