TRIUMPH ENGINEERING CO. LTD. RECORDS

MSS.123

TRIUMPH ENGINEERING CO. LTD. RECORDS

1940-1990

<span class="wrapper"><p>Harry Louis &amp; Bob Curris, The story of Triumph motorcycles (Cambridge, 1975; 2nd edn., 1978).</p> <p>J. Bruce-Gardyne, Meriden. Odyssey of a lame duck (1978); Ivor Davies, It's a Triumph (1980): R.F. Currie, 'Siegfried Bettman', Dict. Bus. Biog., vol.1 (1984).</p></span>

English

7 SERIES

This motorcycle manufacturer derives from the bicycle factors, S.Bettman & Co., formed in 1885. The company changed its name to Triumph Cycle Co. in 1887 and began to manufacture its own bicycles in 1889. After the firm had diversified into motor car production, the motorcycle side of its business was acquired by J.Y. Sangster in 1936 under the name Triumph Engineering Co. Ltd. The business was sold to BSA in 1951, which, in its turn, was sold to Manganese Bronze Holdings in 1973, and took on the name Norton Villiers Triumph. Controversy over NVT's proposed closure of its Triumph subsidiary led to a work-in and the emergence in 1975 of Synova Motors Ltd., trading as the Meriden Motorcycle Co-operative.

The complex history of this undertaking has led to the destruction and dispersal of many of its records. The company was formed in London but moved to Coventry in 1889. Its factory was destroyed in the bombing of 1940; the present factory, at Allesley, near Meriden, was opened in 1942. A small group of Siegfried Bettman's personal papers has been deposited in the Coventry City Record Office (Acc.Nos. 515 and 627). More recent records have been transferred to NVT's Liquidator. The records described below were received on deposit from the Co-operative in February 1976. The Centre also has a press-cuttings file on the Meriden occupation and the Co-operative (MSS.123B/10/1).

In July 1983 Triumph Motorcycles (Meriden) Ltd. went into liquidation. In November 1983 there was a sale of machinery, etc., on site and the firm's assets were bought by the Midlands businessman, John Bloor. Subsequently Racing Spares of Newton Abbott, Devon were licensed to produce the Triumph 750 and Triumph Motorcycles Coventry Ltd. was established at Exhall to develop a new model.