LMS Route: Rugby to Wolverhampton
LMS Route: Nuneaton to Leamington

Coventry Station: lnwrcov625a

Close up of image 'lnwrcov625' showing the entrance and the main concourse area in front of the refeshment room on the right. On the right is an ex-LMS telephone booth and one of British Automatc Company's metal nameplate stamping machines. Having inserted your one penny you would move the hand on the large dial to the letter of choice and pull the handle on the side in the manner of a fruit machine. The Aluminium strip would feed through to the front of the machine for collection. In essence they operated similar to a large 'Dymo' which were in fact an adaptation of the technology of the metal-strip embossing machine. An American plumber named De Souza came up with the idea of creating a hand-held version using a plastic strip in 1954. He sold the idea to the International Rotex (later Dymo) Corporation (now part of Esselte-Dymo, the Swedish office equipment giant). It arrived in Britain in 1959. See below for a photograph of a preserved model at Edinburgh Museum reproduced with acknowledgement to Douglas Bryce.

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