2nd December 1936. Lord Nuffield.

Today in 1936 the magazine Punch featured a drawing by E.H Sheperd’s ‘Horn of Plenty: Say When!’, underneath was written ‘With Mr Punch’s congratulations to Lord Nuffield who has increased his enormous gift to Oxford University for medical research another £750,000′.(1)

William Morris had started as a repairer of cycles and motor-cycles and later the broadcaster Freddie Grisewood recollected his friend at Magdalen College kept his motor-cycle in Morris’ yard at the corner of Longwall and Holywell.

In 1912 Morris took Grisewood, out for a trial spin in a car he had put together and it was not many years afterwards that a Morris car appeared on the market-the car on which he took such a gamble and after the price was cut to the bone.

Examples of Morris cars, and subsidiaries, at the time of the formation of BMC.

The Morris garage consisted of a yard and a pent-house built against New College Wall where Morris and a man called Bishop carried out ‘incredibly skilled repairs for impecunious enthusiasts’.

The first Morris Oxford left a former military academy in Cowley in 1913. He then moved into car lights in 1909, and electric horns and batteries in 1911. The Lucas Company, prospered in 1915, when Morris ordered a fan-pulley belt driven Lucas system for his new Cowley model.

The car industry grew phenomenally, in the early 20th century, with a multiplicity of makers including the thrifty, cycling William Morris, remembered by neighbours for his cheery waves from his bike, having started with a bike shop on Cowley Road, Oxford. A worker later remembered his temper could be gauged as to how he wore his hat.

The Wrigley Company was a British car and components manufacturer of Foundry Lane, Birmingham, which made its last car in 1913, before being acquired by Morris in January 1924, after which Morris Commercial Cars Ltd had the use of the brand name until its merger with Leyland.

The Nuffield parent company was founded in 1938 by William Morris (1^st Viscount Nuffield) having previously acquired Wolseley, Riley and MG and then to merge with its old enemy Austin in 1952, to form British Motor Corporation.

In 1966 BMC acquired Jaguar and on the 14th December 1966, became British Motor Holdings, to finally merge with Leyland Motor Corporation to become British Leyland Motor Corporation (BLMC) in 1968. This resulted from political pressure by the Labour Government’s Industrial Reorganization Committee under Tony Benn.

The result was competition between too many different models and trims: ‘Badge Engineering’ to keep customer loyalty and set to be the undoing of the British car industry, which despite being one of the first in the field, was to succumb to foreign competition in the 1960’s.

(1) Viscount Nuffield, like all great entrepreneurs then, had left school at 15 to work on bikes and motor-cycles. He died full of honours as CBE,CH,FRS,MA on August 22nd 1963, aged 85 at Nuffield Place, Nuffield, Oxon.

Trivia on William Morris, later Lord Nuffield.

His  house a time capsule of the 1930’s was taken by the National Trust. The bedroom was carpeted in off-cuts, and the wardrobe revealed a workshop full of tools and Phillips stick-on-soles.

He was a dedicated smoker and the house was scattered with smoking paraphernalia, including sheet-music of ‘songs for smoker’.

Nuffield’s legendary generosity was reflected by an anecdote of the comedian Arthur Askey, when doing a show at Grosvenor House in the 1930’s, he quipped that by mentioning Players cigarettes and Johnny Walker whisky if directors had been in the audience, he would have been inundated with these products.

When he hopefully said ‘I still think ‘Austin’ is the finest car in the world’, later Morris had said to Askey, ‘If you had said ‘Morris’ is the best car in the world, you would have had a Morris car delivered to your door, you won’t get a bloody spanner from Austin!’

Ref: The World Goes By. F. Grisewood, Secker & Warburg 1953. A photo of the time shows a sign: The Oxford Garage. Morris Cycle Works. Cycles and Motors repaired. In front are models of a Panhard, Humber, Wolseley and a de Brion.

Ref: Anita Singh 27^th April 2011/article.

Ref: Headington.org.uk/history.

Ref: engrail history.info.

Ref: wikipedia.org/british_presseded_steel_company.