Despite both my parents being from Sunderland, I was born in Norfolk but was apprenticed to Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft in Coventry. I had no idea of the Northern origins of the company; nobody ever talked about the past. It was only when I bought a book - "Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft Since 1913" by Oliver Tapper, that I became aware of how the company started. The book has a short history of W.G (later Baron) Armstrong and Joseph Whitworth, and a number of photographs of planes under construction in the Newcastle area in the FWW. The Siddeley connection came about because Siddley Deasy of Coventry were making aircraft engines during the FWW and subcontracted the making of many parts to Armstrong Whitworth in Newcastle. In 1919 Armstrong Whitworth decided to buy Siddeley Deasy, forming The Armstrong Whitworth Development Co and formed a subsidiary called Armstrong Siddeley, who made the cars and aircraft engines based in Coventry, and the AW aircraft production was also moved from Newcastle to Coventry to a new factory. John Siddeley, who had been responsible for the success of Siddley Deasy, was elected to the board of Armstrong Whitworth in Newcastle in 1926, but fell out with the company and made an audacious take-over bid to buy the Coventry outfit, which happened in 1927. The company was then the Sir W.G.Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft Company. In 1935 Siddeley suddenly sold his aircraft interests to Hawker Aircraft, and this was the start of the Hawker Siddeley Group. I left the company in 1963. With the contraction of the aerospace industry it went through the names Whitworth Gloster, then Avro Whitworth, and then disappeared into the rest of the Hawker Siddeley Group, the Coventry factories being shut down. Armstrong Siddeley had become a separate group in Hawker Siddeley at that time, and stopped making the cars in the early '60's. The engine business survived at Coventry and was merged eventually into the Rolls Royce business. One thing that has surprised me is that, when I worked there we had 11,500 employees. Friends Reunited lists less than 50 ex-employees, far less than most similar-sized outfits. I have no idea why the ex-employees have such little interest in what was a very successful company. Adrian ==== DUR-NBL Mailing List ==== To Post a message to this list send it to, DUR-NBL-L@rootsweb.com ==== DUR-NBL Mailing List ==== List Web Page http://www.communigate.co.uk/ne/durhamgenealogy/index.phtml ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to DUR-NBL-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message