Rejoice in city’s culture title win, don’t knock it
AFTER reading the letter by Mr Brian Nathan-Partridge, I formed the impression that the only reason our city was awarded the UK City of Culture title was because of a carefully choreographed presentation by our culture team.
The award had nothing to do with the 1,000 years history of our city, the fact that we were once the Capital of England, or that Kings, Queens and all manner of royalty once frequented here.
He doesn’t mention the great achievements brought about by Coventry people, such as the bicycle industry, the watch making industry, motorcar and motorcycle manufacturing.
In his correspondence, he omits to say that Coventy gave the world the jet engine and countless other inventions.
I could go on extolling the virtues of our great city, and so should he as well as other Coventry Culture ‘detractors’.
To think that other cities competing for the title wouldn’t adopt the same tactics as our culture team is being naïve at the very least.
So I would say to Mr NathanPartridge, instead of banging on about our lack of night life, or the pound shops and closed shops, accept the fact that your city has won the coveted title, so celebrate, rejoice and indulge in it instead of apologising for it. Peter Surtees
Bedworth
Fondness for city’s old mill machinery
RE: Foleshill Mill photograph (Dec 7).
I have had an interest in water mills ever since my dad took us for a bicycle ride to the then ruined Guys Cliffe Mill near Warwick in the 1950s.
Dad even made me a model mill wheel out of wood and used a hose pipe to power it next to a small pond in our garden.
Another mill I remember from that period was the old Whitley Mill in Abbey Road. This was disused at the time and was demolished in 1956.
The mill machinery from Whitley was put into storage by the Coventry museum and still exist in a rather dilapidated state.
The Whitley Local History Group, under the guidance of the late Reg Kimber, inspected the machinery and Reg made great efforts to have it restored and put on display to the public.
Various sites were considered including Whitley school and the Jaguar business park at Whitley.
All of these came to nothing due to cost and safety considerations.
I now understand that the Charterhouse group have plans to put the remains of the machinery on display on their site.
Let us hope they are successful. Bill Sutton Chapelfields