Diesel74
Cornwall
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271 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 10:18am
On 24th Jun 2025 10:13am, Helen F said:
I had a look at the fire insurance maps for 1897 and sure enough number 5 doesn't exist. It goes 1, 3, 4 , 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. So 5 must refer to the passage through to the market.
Coventry was ever-changing.
It was always a topic of conversation. My grandparents, who brought me up, would talk fondly about the pre-war city. My great-grandparents would talk about the changes they witnessed. If we think it's been bad in my era, it's not anything new :D
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Helen F
Warrington
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272 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 10:24am
Because my chosen era is the Civil War, I tend not to know that much about the pre war era, but it was changing very fast. There's almost a game to be created called 'WW2 or town planners?' The trauma of the war damage must have merged with the changes that were already going on.
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Diesel74
Cornwall
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273 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 10:31am
I worded my initial response badly.
The city centre changed immeasurably in the decades before the Blitz. My grandmother was still bemoaning the loss of Little Butcher Row in the early noughties!
Change is the only constant in Coventry.
I haven't been back for a couple of years and I'm dreading heading that way this autumn.
My wife wants to stay at the Telegraph Hotel and I could think of nothing worse, ruining my memories of that place  but memories remain when buildings and people don't.
Mark
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PhiliPamInCoventry
Holbrooks
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274 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 10:31am
Yes, the numbers that were or are blank.
Streets exist in Coventry now, where specific house numbers do not exist. Very near to where I was raised in Sewall Highway, house number 289 doesn't exist. Plots were allotted to a developer, but house designs & access ways interfere with pre allocated numbers.
Living in a society where we are almost forced to establish who is telling the truth, it's anomalies like that which often reveal authenticity.
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Annewiggy
Tamworth
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275 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 12:42pm
Not Coventry but probably similar to house building in Coventry we live on a corner, one side of which is private and the other a crescent of council houses. The land was acquired in the 1930's and the short road of private houses was built by Mucklows before the war. Building was stopped in 1939 and I believe much of the remaining land was allotments. After the war the land was sold by the owner to the council. Approval had to be given by the ministry of health for some reason before being allocated as blocks to several builders over time. There are 2 areas I know of where numbers are missing because the builder who was supposed to build them went bust. The first 8 houses were built by apprentices in a council scheme. I wonder if something similar was set up in Coventry. A lot of this information can be found in the newspaper archives.
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Choirboy
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276 of 280
Tue 24th Jun 2025 1:28pm
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Annewiggy
Tamworth
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277 of 280
Sat 5th Jul 2025 12:24pm
Just browsing through The City of Coventry, Images from the Past, book (forgotten what wonderful pictures there were in it) I came across this picture of the row of shops dated 1936 showing the roofs of the buildings behind.

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Positively Pottering
East Midlands
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278 of 280
Sat 5th Jul 2025 1:05pm
On 24th Jun 2025 10:31am, Diesel74 said:
I worded my initial response badly.
The city centre changed immeasurably in the decades before the Blitz. My grandmother was still bemoaning the loss of Little Butcher Row in the early noughties!
Change is the only constant in Coventry.
I haven't been back for a couple of years and I'm dreading heading that way this autumn.
My wife wants to stay at the Telegraph Hotel and I could think of nothing worse, ruining my memories of that place  but memories remain when buildings and people don't.
Mark
You'll be pleasantly surprised if you stop at the hotel.
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rocksolid
Bristol
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279 of 280
Sun 6th Jul 2025 4:19pm
On 5th Jul 2025 12:24pm, Annewiggy said:
Just browsing through The City of Coventry, Images from the Past, book (forgotten what wonderful pictures there were in it) I came across this picture of the row of shops dated 1936 showing the roofs of the buildings behind.
You're right Anne, it is a fabulous book with many images I've not seen elsewhere. Also because it is printed on good quality glossy paper the detail is much sharper. It's published by Jones-Sands, a firm I've never heard of and not seen any other publications by. It's such a pity the other David McGrory books from Amberley/History Press are on inferior paper and the images not as crisp.
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Annewiggy
Tamworth
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280 of 280
Sun 6th Jul 2025 5:34pm
And amazingly there is couple on Abebooks for under £4 and one on eBay for £5.22, I would recommend to anybody at that price.
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