Courtaulds

Hi, I did state that there were three chimneys on the Great Heath site, the one nearest in the photo is the boiler house. The chimney on the right is from the early Courlose plant & was also a fume chimney. So, I still have to solve what the chimney is on my google photo. Best wishes to you.

This is the chimney viewed from Kingfield Rd. I have viewed it from google now, and at high mag, the brickwork is a mix of flem, block & stretch, which is consistent with early twentieth century brickwork construction. So where is it on the Midland Red photo? At no time did I ever know that there were four chimneys on the Ctlds Great Heath site, I only ever remember three. This is all very exciting, hey! Time for a sherry before bed. Am trying to recollect from my once only ever actual visit to the base of the 365 chimney & I am sure that it was visible from the Pridmore Rd gates, which is borne-out from the Midland Red photo.

Some late news. The boiler house chimney nearest the camera was blitzed in April 1941 when a huge chunk of the buildings nearest the Coventry end of the site were destroyed. The boiler house was re-built adjacent to Kingfield Rd.

I now have a photo recorded a few days after April 1941. The original boiler house chimney still standing in a sea of total destruction. The chimney was deemed unsafe & was demolished soon after. The camera is pointing east towards the Foleshill Rd. I retired in 1999, & at that date, the 365 chimney was still intact. I noticed that the city council intended to preserve the chimney as well as the clock tower but the cost of maintaining the chimney was too tall an order (pun). If you go to the Coventry Telegraph site, you will see that the council intended to preserve huge chunks of the Little Heath Courtaulds, but that went the same way. ps. I have told Miss Marple that the case is solved and that she need not come.

The boilers were massive, providing HP steam not only for heating but powered a turbine to power machinery. The residential houses built by the company received their first electric supply from this 200 volt supply. Hope you like.

Ah, Little Heath! That was the British Celanese factory originally; it became part of Courtaulds in 1957. Back in the 1960s, my brother worked for a company that did a lot of contract sheet metal work and fabrication work for that plant. Part of it, where he often had to work, was known as 'the seven storey mill', where the cellulose acetate was made. One of the managers there was a personal friend of his. I think Miss Marple ought to have spent a lot of time there! There was apparently a lot of thieving from the plant, and one night in early 1960s the security stopped everyone leaving and searched for contraband. All they found was one employee with a 3 foot long length of steel rod down his trouser leg. The same night, a 3-section aluminium ladder went missing...and no-one ever figured out how it was got out!

Hello, Keith. My photos are of the main works site, not Little Heath. My reference to Little Heath was drawing a parallel with the councils intentions never becoming fact. The Little Heath site was a big embarrassment in another way. The ground area including right up to the canal & beyond was found to be highly toxic with waste, going back half a century & more. So eveyone wanted out of it, the council too. I am hoping to receive some later pics of the 365 chimney before it was taken down.

Hi Philip Yes, I did realise that; it was just that you said "Little Heath" - it made my little grey cells click into gear! I'm not surprised that site was toxic - viscose production has a sulphurous waste product !! The British Celanese main site was Spondon, Derby (my brother's firm did work there, too) and of course that was bought by Courtaulds, too. And now, I see, what was left of Courtaulds is a Hong Kong owned company...sigh...

This next picture, is at the end of the eighties when both chimneys, 365 on the right, are viewed from St.Pauls Rd. The pic is from 'Cov-Kid' There is work in progress at the top of the chimney then.

The Ctlds group was sectioned into Fibres & Textiles, Chemicals & Business export. The parent company is Akzo Nobel based in the Netherlands. The operation that moved to the Far East was for convenience of trading there. Akzo Nobel still have the controlling influence, except for some smaller units that are totally independent like CEL who I was employed by. Amtico is also independent. Both Amtico & CEL still operate in Coventry. Hey, I hope they have not gone to Japan. (panic stations) I was going for my Christmas dinner next Tuesday. What bus goes to Japan?

So I guess you were part of the Chemicals company, not textiles? I presume that Little Heath and Foleshill Road were part of Textiles? BTW - And what's wrong with going to Japan for your Xmas dinner? Sushi is better for you than a traditional Xmas dinner - honestly!!!

Here's reflective view of the "stump" in 2007

Great shot I read on the net from a pupil that the class had someone come in to discuss the building of the tallest chimney of Courtaulds he recalls being told that it was made up of lots of different coloured brick the reason being it was the fashion at the time.

Hi all "Courtaulds built a chimney, it wasn't built for smoke. It took the stink from Foleshill & dropped it over Stoke."

The chimney in the picture was the boiler house chimney. The tall chimney was, as Philip says, used to extract fumes from the spinning machine and dump them over the city. That chimney is just out of frame. Everyone knows the clock tower but I cannot recall the other tower on the right. perhaps it was demolished before my time there. It was said that the tall chimney was 365 ft tall and the top was exactly level with the top of the cathedral, probably just an urban myth. At the bottom of the clock tower was a plaque saying "Samuel Courtaulds first produced artificial fibre on this spot" it also gave the year but I can no longer recall the date. Les