Herbert Austin's Grave

I saw nothing much of interest on my lunchtime walk in Lickey Woods today, so for my blip I stopped in the churchyard to take this photo of the grave of Herbert Austin (the founder of the Austin Motor Company), and his wife Helen.

The long history of car manufacture at Longbridge could so easily not have happened. Though Austin was born in England, his early career was spent in Sydney, Australia, working for the Wolseley Sheep Shearing Machine Company. When the company moved assembly to England in 1893, Austin set up a factory in Broad Street, Birmingham.

Because the demand for shearing machinery was highly seasonal, Austin was always on the lookout for ideas for diversification, and became interested in motor cars. He designed two cars for the Wolseley company but the board were never enthusiastic, believing that there was no profitable future for a motor industry!

In 1905 he set up the Austin Motor Company in an old print works in Longbridge. In 1952 this merged with Morris Motors Limited to become the British Motor Corporation Ltd. It later became part of British Leyland and continued under various guises until its ultimate demise in 2005.

In 1936 he was created "Baron Austin of Longbridge in the City of Birmingham". After his death in 1941 the peerage became extinct because his only son had been killed in action in France in 1915.