Mick Hamer is an award-winning journalist, author and musician. He has been a freelance journalist for more than 45 years. For most of this time he was New Scientist’s transport correspondent. In 2001 he was short-listed in the Syngenta science writing awards. In May 2018 his book A Most Deliberate Swindle was named popular transport book of the year.
For the past seven years he has been researching an exposé of a dirty tricks campaign that killed off the British tram. His latest book, The Great Tramways Conspiracy, reveals the untold story of this campaign to smear trams as obsolete and drive them off the roads. The incessant labelling of trams as obsolete became common currency and the mud stuck. In 1931 the Royal Commission on Transport, which was dominated by tram-hating motorists, called for trams to be scrapped.
The Great Tramways Conspiracy will be published by Pen and Sword on 30th May.
You’ll find a bit more about his journalism on the telling tales drop-down menu. Elsewhere on this site, you’ll also find a brief biography and a small select collection of old articles.
Mick lives in Brighton and has another life moonlighting as a jazz pianist. You can find his music website here.