Rugby Cement

Cement production still continues at the New Bilton site in Rugby under Cemex ownership.

[1][2][3] The business was first started in 1825 as a small family business by two local businessmen Thomas Walker and his son George Walker when they started producing lime mortar at a site on their land at New Bilton and nearby Newbold-on-Avon, exploiting locally available deposits of what Professor H.B.

Woodward described in 1898 as "the finest inland section of lower lias limestone in the country".

The company began to expand its activities, acquiring four plants at nearby Southam in 1934, Rochester in 1937, Gillingham in 1939, and Stockton in 1945.

The first two were rebuilt and modernised with the latest technology, but the latter two were soon closed down as they competed with the Southam and Rochester plants.