Tilling (Sussex) Tilling (Sussex) Tilling is a fictional coastal town, based on Rye, East Sussex, in the "Mapp and Lucia" novels of Edward Frederic Benson (1867–1940). Tilling takes its name from the River Tillingham which flows through Rye. Benson himself moved to Rye in 1918, where he lived in Lamb House, former home of the novelist Henry James. Benson was mayor of Rye 1934-7 and was elected Speaker of the Cinque Ports in 1936. Tilling first appeared in "Miss Mapp" (1922) and subsequently in "The Male Impersonator" and "Desirable Residences" (short stories of 1929), "Mapp and Lucia" (1931), set between June 1930
Thomas Tilling a BTC subsidiary to run Tilling's London private hire business, which continued under nationalisation. BET retained its independence but the BTC ultimately gained up to a 50% holding in 17 of its companies so, from 1949, there were still two major bus groups, the nationalised BTC (formerly Tilling) and BET (partly owned by the BTC). By 1955 the BTC and BET companies were often known as the "Associated Companies" since "the actual ownership of the buses [was] to a greater or less extent in the hands of one party". The ex-Tilling companies continued to be commonly referred to as the