WORLD FAMOUS The LONDON TAXI Company HISTORY Holyhead Road Coventry ENGLAND "Keeping History Alive"

We met a great chap called Gains who worked here in the Factory - We thought .... It's good to keep history alive ....
The London Taxi Company was a taxi design & manufacturing company based in Coventry, England. It formerly traded as London Taxis International and Carbodies.
Rebranded as The London Taxi Company in October 2010, it was placed in administration in October 2012, with certain assets purchased by Geely to form what is now the London EV Company - A Truly WORLD FAMOUS BRAND - known throughout the World.
In 1997, a new model of taxicab, the TX1 was introduced as a successor to the FX4. Further development resulted in the launch in 2002 of the TXII, powered by a Ford Dura Torq 2.4-litre diesel engine and featuring an integral fold-down ramp for wheelchair users. It also has an intermediate step and swivel-out seat for passengers with moderate walking difficulties.
The Knowledge
The London taxicab driver is required to be able to decide routes immediately in response to a passenger's request or traffic conditions, rather than stopping to look at a map, relying on satellite navigation or asking a controller by radio.
Consequently, the "Knowledge of London" is the in-depth study of a number of pre-set London street routes and all places of interest that taxicab drivers in that city must complete to obtain a licence to operate a black cab. It was initiated in 1865, and has changed little since.
It is the world's most demanding training course for taxicab drivers, and applicants will usually need to pass at least twelve "appearances" (periodical one-on-one oral examinations undertaken throughout the qualification process), with the whole process usually averaging 34 months, to pass.
The Coventry Blitz (blitz: from the German word Blitzkrieg meaning "lightning war" was a series of bombing raids that took place on the English city of Coventry.
The city was bombed many times during the Second World War by the German Air Force (Luftwaffe). The most devastating of these attacks occurred on the evening of 14 November 1940 and continued into the morning of 15 November 1940.
At the start of the Second World War, Coventry was an industrial city of around 240,000 people which, like much of the industrial West Midlands, contained metal and wood-working industries.
Coventry’s factories included production of cars, bicycles, aeroplane engines since 1900, munitions factories.
August to October 1940
There were 17 small raids on Coventry by the Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain between August and October 1940 during which around 198 tons of bombs fell.
Together the raids killed over 176 people and injured around 680.
The most notable damage was to the new Rex Cinema which had been opened in February 1937 and had already been closed by an earlier bombing raid in September.
14 November 1940
Coventry Cathedral in ruins after the Luftwaffe air raid
The raid that began on the evening of 14 November 1940 was the most severe to hit Coventry during the war.
It was carried out by 515 German bombers, from Luftflotte 3 and from the pathfinders of Kampfgruppe 100. The attack, code-named Operation Mondscheinsonate of the city, including monuments and residential areas, would be considerable.
The initial wave of 13 specially modified Heinkel He 111 aircraft of Kampfgruppe 100, which were equipped with X-Gerät navigational devices, accurately dropped marker flares at 19:20 The British and the Germans were fighting the Battle of the Beams and on this night the British failed to disrupt the X-Gerät signals.
The first wave of follow-up bombers dropped high explosive bombs, knocking out the utilities (the water supply, electricity network, telephones and gas mains) and cratering the roads, making it difficult for the fire engines to reach fires started by the later waves of bombers. These later waves dropped a combination of high explosive and incendiary bombs. There were 2 types of incendiary bomb: Those made of magnesium and those made of petroleum.
24 - 3.7 inch AA GUNS
Coventry's air defences consisted of twenty-four 3.7 inch AA guns and twelve 40 mm Bofors.
The AA Defence Commander of 95th (Birmingham) Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery, had prepared a series of concentrations to be fired using sound-locators and GL Mk. I gun-laying radar, and 128 concentrations were fired before the bombing severed all lines of communication and the noise drowned out sound-location. The anti-aircraft batteries then fought on in isolation. Some gun positions were able to fire at searchlight beam intersections, glimpsed through the smoke and guessing the range. Although the Coventry guns fired 10 rounds a minute for the whole 10 hour raid (a total of over 6,700 rounds), only one German bomber was shot down.
.