EAW010080 ENGLAND (1947). Letchworth Garden City Industrial Estate and environs, Letchworth Garden City, 1947

WW2 Structure TBC

Phoenix Motors Ltd / Ascot / Government Training Centre. This was the factory for Phoenix Motors Ltd from 1911 until the company went into liquidation in 1924. During this time, motorcycles and cars were manufactured. After 1924, it appears that there was some further production but this ceased by 1928. In 1928 the premises were taken over by the Ascot Motor and Manufacture Co Ltd, to produce the Ascot Pullin motorcycle and an Ascot car that wasn't produced. The company went into liquidation in 1930. Subsequently the building became the Government Training Centre, but still known as the Ascot. During WW2, the basement was used for making the drums and other parts for the Bombe machines being built by the British Tabulating Machine Company for decrypting the German Enigma signals at Bletchley Park. See: https://sites.google.com/site/bomberebuilt/btm1-htm http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Ascot_Motor_and_Manufacturing_Co http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Phoenix_Motors

T H Dixon Factory. One of the few surviving buildings.

Baldock Road recreation ground.

Common View

Norton Common

Allotments-now railway sidings

Open air swimming pool (1936)

The photo is taken from the south-west. The Garden City Press, occupying two main buldings fronting onto Pixmore Avenue. The upper building housed the offices at the front, then the machine, or press, room, followed by the composing room. The lower building was the bindery and now houses an indoor go-kart track.