I’ve got some great stuff coming up. But here’s a taste of something really exciting from reader and New Year competition winner Fred Butler. I give you… the start of Crabtree, Brownhills, in 1954.
Note the familiar curve in the canal, the familiar chimney of Superalloys. A partially built Midland Auto Rewinds factory. This is the birth of light industry in Brownhills, and would sustain us as a community until the end of the century.
Fred’s got some great stuff. Please stay tuned…
A young Crabtree factory and Superalloys; Lichfield Road from the air in 1954. Not the Midland Auto Rewinds factory under construction bottom centre. Image supplied by reader Fred Butler.
Impossible to mistake the architectural design of a Crabtree factory. This was built precisely along the lines of the Chuckery factory, built in the mid 1920’s. The unusual roofline meant that almost 50% of natural light could enter in this way, giving light and airy working conditions. After all the weird and wonderful architectural innovations, post-war, it was rather nice to see a Company
sticking to a design that really worked for them.
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