Kevin Shurmer, 68, works at Steam, the museum of the Great Western Railway, and has been shortlisted for VisitEngland’s national Tourism Superstar awards. He lives in West Swindon and is married with two children and two grandchildren.

“My earliest memory? I would have been possibly three-and-a half years of age, and this is my only one prior to being five. I was on the railway station with my father. I don’t know where we were going, but a freight train came through Swindon with a noisy steam engine on the front which scared me to death.

“I can remember hiding half behind him and half looking, and I can assure you that was when steam came into my blood. If you gave me a transfusion today it would probably say ‘King George the Fifth’ if you spread it out.”

If ever a person’s heritage was a genetic blueprint for a lifetime of railway enthusiasm, it’s Kevin’s.

He is a fifth-generation railway worker whose paternal great-great grandfather tilled the land at Lydiard until the Works beckoned.

His mother comes from York, another of Britain’s great railway communities. A maternal uncle was a driver there and a paternal uncle is Swindon’s Gordon Shurmer, a former engine cleaner, fireman and driver who is now in his 90s.

Kevin himself was born in York; his father, Alf, was an RAF electrician in World War Two, working on Spitfires and Lancasters – including the Lancasters of the Dambusters. Kevin’s parents met while Alf was stationed at Linton-on-Ouse near York and walked to a dance in the ancient city.

By 1946 Alf’s service was complete and the family were back in Swindon. Kevin grew into a committed train spotter.

“I was on Swindon Station as often as I could get there, trying to chase all these classes of locomotives to completion, which I never did. When we went on holiday to York, which was invariably twice a year, I would spend all my time on York railway station with probably a shilling in my pocket and some sandwiches.

“There was no finer sight than watching the Elizabethan come through non-stop on his way from Edinburgh to King’s Cross.

“A steam locomotive only did what two men on the footplate made it do. It was the skill of the driver and the skill of the fireman. It was hard work but there was pride in the job.

“A steam engine for me, coming through Swindon or York, was poetry in motion.

“If you had a Castle class locomotive coming through Swindon non-stop at 80mph, it sounded like a well-oiled sewing machine. If you had the most famous of all, the King class, the most powerful, that was like a machine gun coming at you. That got the adrenalin flowing from your toes to the top of your head. A steam engine when it was on full pressure was a Ferrari on a racing grid, ready to go.”

Kevin’s favourite locomotives are the A4 Mallard class, and he saw all but one, 60032 Gannet. He reels off the numbers of historic machines with the rapidity of the true enthusiast.

Unlike many steam lovers, he’s also partial to some diesels, especially classic locos the Westerns and Deltics.

Kevin’s childhood ambition was inevitable, but he was to be disappointed.

“I always wanted to be an engine driver from a very early age, pre-school. But unfortunately for me in 1961 I failed my eyesight test, and that included both footplate work and workshop work.”

After doing various jobs, Kevin began what turned out to be a successful career in the medical supplies industry, rising to superviser and manager level.

Between jobs in that field, he worked for about 18 months at the Works as a coach painter, cementing his fifth generation railway worker credentials. Redundancy at 54 allowed him more time to devote to his passion, and a chance encounter brought him to Steam.

“I went to a model railway show in Swindon and met this chap, Dennis Harper, who was engineer-in-chief for restoring the artefacts that were coming into this museum.

“We got chatting. He realised I had time on my hands and said, ‘We could do with you.’ So I joined their volunteers’ group and spent six months preparing things for opening in June 2000.

“When we’d done that and the first customers had come through the door I got a job at the museum.”

The museum opened on June 14 of that year. Kevin started in his new staff role, working front-of-house, five days later – his birthday.

“This gave me the opportunity, for the first time ever, to find confidence in addressing the public, because obviously meeting them coming through the door every day.

“Invariably the public would ask questions about the museum itself or any other aspect of railways and I was lucky enough to have sufficient knowledge to be able to answer – I would say – 97 per cent of them.”

He soon began delivering talks to audiences ranging from children to elderly people, and from casual visitors to corporate guests and VIPs.

Although he has never craved accolades or even recognition, he is proud to have been shortlisted for the Tourism Superstar award.

“That’s confirmation that what I babble on about is the right thing, and people have enjoyed it,” he said.

“It’s something I would never want to stop doing.

“Swindon probably wouldn’t have been Swindon without the Railway Works.

“The Railway Works was Swindon and Swindon was the Railway Works. Everybody knew everybody else.

“We must never, ever forget our heritage. This museum keeps that alive, and as long as I’m alive I’ll carry on doing just that.

“My aim is to make sure that when I’m gone people behind me can carry on the story.

“I love bringing this museum to life.

“If you’re consumed by railways you don’t come to work, you attend a venue that’s a hobby. You can’t beat that.”

The online vote for Tourism Superstar starts on January 31 at www.mirroronline.co.uk