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Chronicle of the 20th Century
Key Events in Nuneaton
and district in the last one hundred years
compiled by Peter Lee

1910-1919

1910
Attleborough windmill ceased production. (demolished in the 1960's)

A new front factory building added to Rufus Jones elastic web works, Attleborough Green. A business originally established in 1873 (Later traded as Lester & Harris Ltd.)

Hart & Levy Ltd., the Leicester merchant tailors, established a branch in Central Avenue, Nuneaton.

The Royal Picture House, Stratford Street opened.

April - Fitton Street School opened.

4th May -  Nuneaton High School for Girls opened.

August - Palace Cinema, Short Street, Stockingford opened.

1911
22nd March - The Nuneaton Star newspaper commences publication. Starts as the Star, then the Nuneaton Star, then the Warwickshire Star.

22nd June - Celebrations in Nuneaton for Coronation of King George V and Queen Mary.

17th August - Railway strike across the country and troops were stationed at key railway installations in Nuneaton. 80 men stopped work at Stockingford.

1912
The post office which stood fronting the Market Place, originally opened in 1890, was pulled down for road widening and a new post office opened close by.

Stockingford (Bucks Hill) cemetery opened.

New water pumping station brought into use at Griff. 220,000 gallons a day was produced. This reached 1,000,000 gallons per day by 1915.

8th April - Leon Vint's Empire theatre was re-named the "Picturedrome", for "first class pictures and high class vaudeville" - this is still a place of entertainment in 1999, the Millenium nightclub on Leicester Road.

1913
Work started on building Corporation Street.

Nuneaton Dramatic Company re-formed.

Major reconstruction of Nuneaton (Trent Valley) station commenced.

Nuneaton Mining School opened.

March - Lucy Askham murdered in Hinckley Road

August - First petrol omnibus ordered by the Nuneaton & Stockingford Omnibus Co. Ltd. Bus was a Tilling Stevens which was brought from the manufacturers to Nuneaton by Mr. Fred Scarr who was engaged in Nuneaton to drive the bus. First service started from the Castle Hotel in the Market Place up to Bucks Hill. Prior to this shoppers and travellers were given a ride up Stockingford in horse drawn "tubs" on Fridays and Saturdays for 3d. up and 2d. down. The "tub" driver would shout "Here you are for the common" - meaning Nuneaton Common, as Stockingford was known. The "tubs" would draw up outside the gas works in Queens Road.

The same week in 1913 the North Warwickshire Motor Traction Co. started a service from Two Gates at Tamworth to Nuneaton. (This service was suspended during WW1)

1914
Nuneaton Corporation's 15T Aveling Porter steam roller (purchased in 1883) was replaced by a 12 ton compound roller by Thomas Green & Sons Ltd. Cost £480 and £50 was given in part exchange for old roller. The new roller had a tipping body which held 3 tons of stone.

Griff Pumping Station opened.

The old Newdigate Arms hotel demolished and a new one built in its place. Cost of redevelopment £8250.

1st February - The Scala Cinema opened.

18th July - Reginald Stanley, former chairman of Stanley Bros. Ltd brickmakers, died aged 76.

August - A six and a half ton roller supplied to the Corporation by Mann's Patent Steam Cart & Wagon Co. Ltd. Leeds. Cost £517.

December - Mr. George Iliffe died, was well known as one of the partners in Iliffes the Chemists in Nuneaton Market Place.

1915
Aircraft hanger, said to be larger than one at the Hendon aerodrome in London erected at Attleborough next to the Trent Valley main line for use by the brother of Edward F.Melly who was a pioneering aviator. The hanger was later converted into an oil store after being re-erected next to Riversley Park.

Andrew Ronald Knox, manager of Haunchwood Brick & Tile Co Ltd.  killed in action in France aged 33.

Courtaulds purchased ground in Marlborough Road to build a factory, materials were delivered but the work was held up because of World War One.

1916
The Nuneaton Chronicle published the first telephone directory in Nuneaton.

March 27th/28th - Blizzard causes havoc in Nuneaton, numerous telephone poles felled.

May -  William Westwood, aged 59, managing director of Stanley Brothers Ltd. died at his house "Briarwood" Princes Street, Nuneaton. He was a batchelor, a native of Buckinghamshire. His brother had been clerk/cashier at Stanleys and William was offered a job with the firm. When his brother died he took over his job and rose from that position.

27th October -  Mr. Henry Stubbs of Camp Hill Hall died. He was 62. He was the son of  Mr.H.J.L.Stubbs of Tittersfield, Ashton-on-Mersey. He was educated at Rugby school and bought Camp Hill Hall in 1878. He was a leading local sportsman being an expert horseman, polo player, cricketer, on the board of the Nuneaton Theatre Co. for many years and one of the leading lights in the founding of the Prince of Wales Theatre. He was a director of Yates Brewery of Birkenhead and Liverpool and a director of Stanley Brothers. He helped found the Nuneaton Conservative Club.

1917 
The original Co-Op store opened in Queens Road (later demolished when the Co-Op Hall opened in 1938).

The Nuneaton railway control office dealt with 90,000 wagon movements per week with a staff of 17, with 35-40 collieries feeding coal onto the system, handling goods from numerous brickyards and seven stone quarries, not to mention huge quantities of general merchandise. 3000 monition workers travel daily from Nuneaton to Coventry.

The Nuneaton Empire Music Hall operated by Mr. Leon Vint closed. This is now the Millennium nightclub.

Joe Whitehouse started his bus service.

Nuneaton Museum opened.

Mr. Williams started the Trelawny Bus Co. which loaded in Queens Road for the "old lane" up Haunchwood Road to Whittleford.

May - A temporary war memorial was erected.

1918
July - Lieutenant Leonard Cecil Knox VC and Corporal William Beesley VC made honorary freemen of the Borough. Wm. Beesley who later lived in Brooklyn Street, Foleshill was the last freeman of the Borough when he died.

November -. At the end of World War 1,  675 Nuneaton men died in war service.

1919 
Mr. Laker, thought to be the father of the airline owner Sir Freddie Laker started an air service from Nuneaton.

Nuneaton Rugby Club leased the field at the back of the New Inn, Attleborough (later known as the Rugger Tavern) and the ground became the Harry Cleaver ground.

Swinnerton & Co, timber merchants in Regent Street became a limited company trading as: The Nuneaton Timber Co. Ltd.

Midland Sheet Metal Works established in the old foundry at Chilvers Coton to make sheet metal car bodies for the motor trade.

Nuneaton Town football ground known later as Manor Park was sold to Nuneaton Town F.C. by Charles Moore who bought 25 acres known as Wash Lane Farm. Cost £230. 

Part of the embankment in former Wash Lane (now Queens Road) removed to build Lamb's Billiards Hall.