William Walmsley
| William Walmsley | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1892 , UK |
| Died | 1961 Poulton-le-Fylde, England, UK |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | British automobile designer |
| Known for | Co-founder of Swallow Sidecar, later to become Jaguar Cars |
William Walmsley (1892-1961) was with William Lyons a co-founder of the Swallow Sidecar Company, which later became the Jaguar car company.
Walmsley was born in , the son of a coal merchant. He served in the Cheshire Yeomanry Regiment during the 1914-18 War, receiving an injury to his leg. When his father retired in 1921, the family moved to Blackpool. Walmsley then lived in King Edward Avenue, close to William Lyons. Walmsley was good with his hands and had learned basic principles of coachbuilding as part of the family coal transporting business. He designed a motorcycle sidecar on a Watsonian chassis which he attached to an ex-War Department Triumph. It had a bullet-shaped streamlined octagonal body, quite unusual for the day. Only Harley-Davidson in the USA had anything similar. He called it the "Ot-as-Ell", and soon found that other motorcycle enthusiasts wanted one. He began refurbishing ex-WD bikes and building sidecars in his garden shed at the rate of perhaps one a week, the trimming being done by his wife. He registered the design officially in April 1921 and advertised it at £28. The polished aluminum sidecar attracted his 20-year-old neighbor Lyons, who bought one. The following year, the two men decided to begin producing the sidecar commercially. The Swallow Sidecar Company of Blackpool was the result, the partnership officially beginning a week after Lyons' 21st birthday for legal reasons.
The octagonal Model 1 was very popular, and soon Walmsley and Lyons were riding Brough Superiors with their sidecars to the November 1922 Motorcycle Show in London. Within two years it was joined by other models including a long-tailed pentagonal Model 4 and a lozenge shaped Model 6 called the "Scrapper".
The first Swallow bodied car was quite unofficial, Walmsley having obtained the burnt-out remains of an Austro-Daimler car and brought it to the factory to be rebodied by his employees, though he paid them for this work.
In 1927, the company started coach-building for motorcars, putting their own sporting bodywork on an Austin Seven chassis, and became known as the Swallow Sidecar and Coachbuilding Company. They built many Austin Swallows, and also bodied Wolseley, Morris, Swift, Alvis and Fiat chassis. In late 1928 the company moved to Holbrook, Coventry. By 1929, they had contracted to buy engines and chassis from Standard Motor Company, and with Swallow's body they were sold as the Standard Swallow, exhibiting on a stand at the Olympia Show.
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