Employees and their families celebrating the first birthday of the Land Rover with demonstration rides over the air raid shelters next to Solihull’s West Block
THE launch of the Discovery in 1989 had a direct impact on the creation of the first Land Rover Experience centre, which opened in 1991. As the Discovery’s 35th anniversary year comes to an end, it’s a perfect moment to review how the Solihull centre came about, and how the LRE grew to be what it is today. And who better to join us on the journey than Land Rover legend, Roger Crathorne.
“I joined Rover as an engineering apprentice in 1963 and officially retired in 2014,” Roger tells me, “but I continued to work for JLR as an independent consultant until finally stepping down in May 2023, when I was told the company was no longer particularly interested in its Land Rover history.”
Of his remarkable 60 years with the company, 25 were spent with the Demonstration Team and its successor, the Land Rover Experience. “The demo team started around the first birthday of Land Rover in 1949, when Alec Joyce and others created an off-road track over the old air raid shelters at the Solihull factory site.
“Alec was also
