Mosquito factory - Penn Street Works - demolished!

[Antipodean Andy]

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http://www.bucksfreepress.co.uk/news..._buildings.php

The factory where the daredevil Mosquito fighter planes were manufactured during the Second World War has been demolished to make way for 21st century offices.

Modern day developers have done what the Germans in the 1940s would have rated cause for huge celebration - they've flattened Penn Street Works, the group of buildings in the Buckinghamshire countryside where they built de Havilland's legendary twin engined 'Mossie'.

The Mosquito was made largely out of plywood, so it was fitting they were built near a town that was the centre of the furniture industry - a deliberate decision to capitalise on local specialist skills.

The timber propellers and fuselages were assembled in buildings at the back of the site.

After the war, a succession of chair manufacturers took over Penn Street Works. Dancer & Hearn became the largest manufacturer of school stacking chairs in the world, producing as many as 10,000 a week when production was at its peak. In the 1960s and 1970s, Parker Knoll took over the works but in more recent times the buildings have been used for a wide range of purposes.

Guernsey-based Lief Designs acquired the majority of the site two years ago for the office development which will be known as DeHavilland Court.

The first phase will incorporate 14 individual units in three buildings called Mosquito, Rapid and Comet.

The site surrounding the offices next to the popular Hit & Miss pub and Penn Street cricket ground will be landscaped to ensure the new buildings blend into the village setting.

[Kyt]

It is sad but then again if every lot where Mossie parts-production was carried out then we'd be looking at about 150 furniture factories. That's what most of them were. The wooden, laminated production meant that even small family run firms could be commissioned to produce struts etc, whilst the bigger parts were produced by the large specilist companies. It was only the final kits that then put together in proper aircraft factories.

[Antipodean Andy]

True, but I've still got half a mind to release Kitty upon them!