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By Admin at 2007-09-12 22:26
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The Wolseley marque as with many others of its day, takes its name from its founder, the Northern Irish born, Frederick York Wolseley.
The marque is one of the oldest in Britain and held international acclaim as a car maker. The Wolseley Car Company was for the most part the conception of Lord Herbert Austin, who later went on to found his own motor car company. Wolseley is riddled with change throughout its history, once the largest car maker in Britiain, today remains unknown to many.
Wolseley was originally involved in sheep shearing and was based in Austrailia. After Lord Austin paid a visit to Wolseley in Austrailia, he became involved with helping the company improve their designs and eventually in 1887, Wolseley setup a new base of operations in London, England.
With the move to London, the Wolseley company started diversifying into other areas, cotton machine makers and bicycles were both a part of the new company plan. By 1895 the company needed to expand to larger premesis and moved to the Sydney Works in Alma Street, Aston, Birmingham.
It was not long however before Lord Austin would start on a somewhat more personal experiment of producing cars. Initially, the directors of the Wolseley company were not interested in making cars, but by 1900 the company had already produced limited numbers of 3 different models, the first two of which were 3 wheeled examples, steered by a tiller.
After some co-operative work to build a 'war car', Vickers Sons & Maxim Ltd approached the Wolseley company with a view to taking over the motorcar part of their business and an agreement was reached in 1901, when Vickers established the Wolseley Tool and Motor Car Co Ltd. Lord Austin resigned in 1905.
By World War I, the company had renamed once more to 'Wolseley Motor Company ltd' and was now making commercial vehicles as well as motor cars. The company was then Britains largest car manufacturer.
Change once more came about by the 1920s as the company had hit financial difficulties. In the hands of the administrators the company was sold to Lord Nuffield (William Morris, founder of the Morris marque) in 1926, beating the bids by the then rivalling Austin Motor Company, founded by former employee Herbert Austin.
By the start of the World War II, Wolseley cars had become restyled upmarket versions of various Morris cars, and even shared some engines with the Morris Car Company's other aquisition, MG. Sadly, the war efforts had meant the end of car production in favour of making bomb shells.
1952 saw yet another merger and repositioning of the Wolseley brand as owners Morris merged with Rivals Austin, creating the well known British Motor Corporation (BMC). Wolseley was now part of a company that included brands such as Austin, Morris, MG, Riley and Vanden Plas.
More re-badging of other models was to happen and fewer efforts were made to diguise them, particuarlly with the ADO16 (BMC 1100/1300) project, and Wolseley applied the well known 'Hornet' name to a variant of the new Mini, but with a saloon boot.
By 1975 the last Wolseley car was introduced and by 1976 the marque had dissapeared from showrooms altogether and has never resurfaced.
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