9781422283615

The Second World War In 1939 the Second World War broke out and 690,000 children were moved out of London. Unfortunately, many of them had returned when the Blitz began in 1940. The German bombing went on until May 1941. In 1944 flying bombs and rockets began to fall on the city. By the end of the war 30,000 people had been killed

in London and many of the city’s buildings lay in ruins.

Londoners tried to live as normally as possible during the Blitz. Here a postman delivers letters among the ruins of a street. ⌂

A new era London slowly recovered from the war. In 1951 the Festival of Britain was held on the south bank of the River Thames. Two years later, Queen Elizabeth II was crowned in Westminster Abbey. In the 1960s, the city became “Swinging London.” Young people in the city shopped in Carnaby Street boutiquesand danced to new bands such as the Beatles. The millennium and beyond Unemployment grew in London in the 1960s and ’70s, as docks closed and traditional industries declined. In the 1980s, banking, insurance and tourism boomed, and Docklands redevelopment began. An anti- Poll Tax riot and IRA bombs rocked the city in the 1990s. Londoners began the new millennium by electing a government for the city. Today, the city remains a world capital.

Protesters and police at the 1990 Poll Tax riot. The Poll Tax was replaced with a different type of tax in 1993. ⌂

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LONDON

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