Watch and Clock Industry in Coventry

In No 4, the ceilings were at least 10 feet up (upstairs) and I guess downstairs the principal rooms were probably higher, but they were close to us. I think there was a cellar, too, and also a large attic. They were jerry-built, though, very poor quality. Which I guess fits with the Chapelfields area being built in one go in 1845. I think the Earlsdon houses built at the (more or less) same period were probably better built. Compared with a lot of the poky old places around Thomas St and North St they must have seemed like heaven! As well as steps up, many had a raised front yard, too; made them look even more imposing. BTW - do you remember the gents' hairdresser's, Les Stanton? His shop was along there too, wasn't it?

I honestly wouldn't have done Keith but for his sign and barber's pole still being there! It reminds me a lot of the erstwhile radio shop with the high steps up to the front door.

Interesting photos, but sad, both. In Lexor, when you went up those steep stairs and turned right, that was into the main office containing Personnel. I think Jay Lucas, the MD, had his office in another room beyond. The top floor was Accounts, where Ralph Treadwell, company secretary, was sited. Terrific view from up there! I told the story of someone looking up those steep stairs on a hot day, and one of the office girls going up them in a 'baby doll' style dress, was obviously going commando. So he went up, straight into Personnel and complained! Not exactly sporting, methinks!! We had the office party at Christmas in that office. Jim Pledger's wife bought him a brass cannon to put on his desk, in, as I remember, 1972. He had it bored out, and a touch hole made, and then proceeded to make some gunpowder. Several times, in No 4, he fired it, using a bit out of Burgess engraver as a projectile. When it was time for the party, he took the cannon with him, having put a rather larger charge in it. When he fired it - in the party - the barrel split, and he lost the engraving bit, which buried itself in the wooden partition at the top of the stairs. He was a dangerous so-and-so to be anywhere near! Anyway, there was some gunpowder left, and it was in a lid off an aerosol, on the bench in my room at No 4. Jay Lucas came in, in the early new year, with his usual cigarette in a long holder, and beaming, said "Never anywhere for smokers in this b---y place, James!" Jim pushed the aerosol lid forward, and he was just about to flick the ash in, looked and said "No, I don't think I will..." JP dipped a hot soldering iron in it, and a two-foot flame shot up.... As I said, a dangerous person to be anywhere near - and I had three years working for, and very close to, him!!

Incidentally, just to add a little. Jim Pledger was ex-Aerials Group in the Trunk Radio Lab at Telephone Works. When I was there, working in the next section, I rapidly realised that they were as mad as hatters. One tried to get me up the aerial tower one day, and I said I wouldn't go above the first platform, about 40 feet up. "It's quite safe, come on up!" No way mate! I watched them working, without safety harness, on a six-inch wide plank, 150 feet up at the top. Nothing, but nothing, would have got me up there - I may be a lot of thing,s but, unlike them, I wasn't crazy!!

I was wondering if there is anything left of the premises that were used by the company that made Coventry Astral clocks - originally the watchmaking firm of Charles Hutton Errington, later bought by Williamson's? (Who in their turn were bought by Smiths, the Astral name used in their product line, and the production moved elsewhere) Errington's was a quite famous name, so should be remembered in Coventry. I have an Edwardian Astral clock, obviously from the Williamson's period, so about 1918-20, of very high quality, unlike many of the products that later bore the name. Here is the Coventry Astral logo:

I have found out that Errington's factory was at No 8 Allesley Old Road. Is that still there? If it is there ought to be a blue plaque on it too, for such a renowned maker.

There is Keith but the entire street was renumbered at some stage and it is now No49 on the corner of Lord Street opposite the Nursery Tavern

Thanks both - obviously one of the bigger businesses. As I said, it should both be preserved and a blue plaque on it. He was a very important maker - one of the most important Coventry makers. The Astral clock that I own is beautifully made, almost as finely made as a French clock, and very similar in concept to a 100mm French movement by a maker like the famous Japy Freres. When I worked at Lexor, I was at No 4, two doors up from the corner of Hearsall Lane; what would that be numbered as now?

You're mistaken Keith. It was then and still is No31 Allesley Old Road/No20 Duke Street and is two full blocks away from the corner of Hearsall Lane!

Another link is on the 28DL site here

No, that's not it - that was the main office. It was two doors up from the corner of Hearsall Lane, Downstairs there was a dental mechanic making dentures. (He was always blocking the drains!!) I don't know what was at No 2. The workshop behind No 4 reached all the way to Hearsall Lane, and there was a back entrance from there - a high wall, with a break in it, and the upper workshop visible above the wall. Looks like it's No 15 now. On Streetview, it's recently pebble dashed, with a 'To Let' sign outside, and a sign proclaiming that it's Compucut. No 2 has a completely rebuilt workshop, but I can see about 10-12 feet of the old workshop behind what was No 4. It has some new windows and brickwork, but otherwise looks much as it was. On the 28DL link, it's the second house form the left. Lexor had 4 sites. Main office at Lord St, workshop about half way down towards Hearsall Lane, Development at No 4 [15 njow], and production was at 69 Hearsall LAne. We were really fit, forever walking from one site to another!

You're quite correct, sir! The old postcard view on 28DL is not the AORd/Duke Street building at all, it's as you say the first few buildings beyond Hearsall Lane

Since you're telling me I'm wrong again, I suggest that you ask Andrew Barber, of the Coventry Watch Museum project. Andrew was in charge of the workshop, which was at the rear of, if I have the number correct (it was always odd) No 12. And, having done so, you may wish to apologise.

The Lexor main building was on the corner of Duke Street, not Lord Street. No4 Allesley Old Road was a neon sign shop in Stanley Terrace on the North side of Allesley Old Road along with all the other even numbers. There has been no No4 on the South side since the 19th century. No17 Allesley Old Road was also No4 Hearsall Lane which is where the confusion may have arisen?

The GPO Telephone Directory lists Lexor at 25 AORd in 1959 From 1962 to 1976 they're at 31 In 1977 it's Rowley Drive