Coventry on film

Hi Neil, 1986 was the official abolishment of loose coupled stock of any kind. The end of both grey & brown guards vans on freight trains.

I do remember the Goods Yard earlier than that. Once many of tracks had been pulled up it was for many years a very pot-holed car park behind the offices. Dad used to park there on our weekly Saturday morning runs in to town.

That brings back memories of old cheap car parks that my Dad favoured. The important word being 'cheap'. Pot holes you could lose a child in... although that may have been the plan.

That's it Helen - there was also another one on the slice of land beside Croft Road next to the GEC. Where the Skydome is now - you'll remember that one Rob!

Quick glimpse of St Johns Church episode 1 screened on 22nd October.

More old Cov Gold from John Wells on YT - this time from the '60's............

I don't normally check out modern film reviews of Cov but this one was good to see and really postive!

Neil, see post 27 on the 'Coventry Voted an Ugly City' topic.

Sorry argon I must've missed that. They also enjoyed stopping in Cook Street Gate!

You can't see much of the City, and it's colourised, but amazing to see this in 1902.

That's right Neil, I do watch some of that couple's videos of different town visits as they are usually interesting and take me to places I can no longer visit myself.

Has anyone ever seen any archive moving/ground level footage of the Butcher Row area at all? There are some lovely snippets of other areas of old Cov here but only a few seconds worth and its only from one of the Spires down once Trinity Street had gone in - though you can see the corner in to Derby Lane. The bits of old Broadgate are so nice as well.

The 1937 map doesn't show Trinity Street finished or the Prudential building on Broadgate built, so the filming must be the very back end of the 30s. The map also doesn't show the area to the south of the Drapers Hall flattened to make way for a new museum. Some of the Godiva processions are older I recall, but I don't think that they were ever filmed in Butcher Row. Too narrow I suppose or maybe just gone too soon.

This is great reel to reel film. There used to be a traffic policeman at the top of Bishop Street where the road split and I always thought that was a wonderful job. The part of the film I couldn't take my eyes of was the shot of the tram coming down the road and the pedestrians and cyclists wandering in front of it.

One of things I think that the couple got wrong was about Coventry blue. She mentions the river turning blue because of the dye activities, leading to the phrase. While the river might indeed have been dyed blue, the full phrase is 'true as Coventry blue' or 'true blue', which referred to the steadfast nature of the colour in the woollen fabric. The fabric was a high value product but ultimately caused Coventry's downfall. It was a luxury item and when the country fell on hard times, people stopped buying it. Towns that had more industries to fall back on, fared better.