Business and Industry
Gloucester has a long history in the aerospace business. In 1926 the Gloucestershire Aircraft Company at Brockworth changed its name to the Gloster Aircraft Company because international customers claimed that the name "Gloucestershire" was too difficult to spell. A sculpture in the city centre celebrates Gloucester's aviation history and its involvement in the jet engine. Frank Whittle's pioneering turbojet engine powered the first British jet aircraft, which first flew at the company's airfield at Brockworth. This is commemorated by the pub "The Whittle" at Gloucester Business Park, which now occupies the site. Roads in the Business Park are named after other Gloster aircraft, and a small statue overlooks the site of the old main runway. Messier-Dowty's landing gear plant and Smiths Aerospace Dowty Propellers plants are on the outskirts of the city.
Gloucester is home to the headquarters of Cheltenham & Gloucester at Barnwood, a major mortgage lender, and now a subsidiary of Lloyds TSB. The large insurer Ecclesiastical Insurance is based in the city, as is its owner, the charity Allchurches Trust.
Gloucester was the home of Priday, Metford and Company Limited, a family milling firm which survived for over one hundred years, and hydraulic engineering firm Fielding & Platt.
Gloucester Business Park is a business park on the outskirts on the city and is home to a number of big brands including Fortis and Detica.
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Famous quotes containing the words business and, business and/or industry:
“Justice means minding one’s own business and not meddling with other men’s concerns.”
—Plato (427–347 B.C.)
“I am firmly opposed to the government entering into any business the major purpose of which is competition with our citizens ... for the Federal Government deliberately to go out to build up and expand ... a power and manufacturing business is to break down the initiative and enterprise of the American people; it is the destruction of equality of opportunity amongst our people, it is the negation of the ideals upon which our civilization has been based.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“As our boys and men are all expecting to be Presidents, so our girls and women must all hold themselves in readiness to preside in the White House; and in no city in the world can honest industry be more at a discount than in this capital of the government of the people.”
—Jane Grey Swisshelm (1815–1884)