Duck The Great Western Engine

Duck the Great Western Engine is a fictional steam engine from The Railway Series by the Rev. W. Awdry and the spin-off television series Thomas and Friends. He is a green 0-6-0 pannier tank locomotive and lives and works on the Island of Sodor.

The Fat Controller (Sir Topham Hatt) bought Duck from The Other Railway in 1955 to take Percy's place as station pilot at Tidmouth. Since The Fat Controller had been apprenticed at GWR's Swindon Works, he allowed Duck to return to his original Great Western Railway livery, and retain his number '5741', which Duck wears proudly on cast brass numberplates on his cab sides.

Duck is not actually his real name. When he first arrived, he explained that his real name was Montague, but he was usually called Duck because everyone said he waddled. Although he claims this was not true, he prefers Duck to Montague, and now that is what everyone calls him.

The arrival of Duck allowed Percy to move to Thomas' branch line to help Thomas with his goods traffic.

Despite an incident when a devious engine called Diesel spread lies about him, the Fat Controller realized what a useful engine he had in Duck, and eventually gave him a branch line of his very own.

Duck's branch line runs between Tidmouth and Arlesburgh and is nicknamed The Little Western, as all the locomotives and coaches have been restored to Great Western Railway livery. Duck shares the passenger duties with Oliver, but has his own two autocoaches: Alice and Mirabel.

Duck sometimes helps on other lines. He makes friends easily, and the Fat Controller says that he makes everything run like clockwork. "There are two ways of doing things," Duck says, "the Great Western Way or the wrong way." This has been known to annoy the other engines.