William Morris (Lord Nuffield)

(1877 - 1963)

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The greatest Entrepreneur

Lord Nuffield founded Morris Motors, a company that at one stage made every other car sold in Britain. He also gave more than £30 million to charitable causes, many involved in medical research. Despite his wealth, his house was relatively modest and today the house, and its contents are virtually as he left them on his death in 1963. It still exhibits the friendly, lived-in feel of his life there, and gives a unique insight not only into the Nuffields but also into domestic life in general at that time.

William Morris was born in Worcester in 1877 and moved to Oxford with his family when he was three. He left school at 15. A year later he started his own business with £4 capital, making and repairing bicycles at the home of his family, 16 James Street, Oxford. Later he worked with  motor cycles, and then as a garage owner, he started selling, hiring and repairing cars. 

He married Elizabeth Anstey in 1904 but they had no children.

He designed his first car, the Bull Nosed Morris, in 1912 at his garage in Longwall Street, Oxford.  Production on a large scale started  at the disused Military Training College in Hollow Way, Cowley, but after the outbreak of World War I the factory  concentrated on making munitions.  In 1919, 400 cars were produced.  By 1925 the annual output was 56,000.

Between the wars Morris Motors, with Austin,  the Rootes Group and Ford dominated the UK market for popular cars and brought  motoring within reach of the man in the street.  William Morris had a profound effect on the life of the people of Britain, as well as on Oxford.

He is famous not only as an industrialist but also as a man who gave away as much money as he made - at least £30 million in his lifetime (the equivalent of at least £600 million at 1997 value).

He gave money to hospitals and medicine (for example the Nuffield hospitals), to education (for example Nuffield College, Oxford), to the depressed areas and to the armed forces. His benevolence had a profound impact and the proceeds are evident up to the present day.

You can hear a recording of Lord Nuffield's voice, and some of his 1930's music.

Lady Nuffield's Wolseley car is on display, and there are often other visiting classic and veteran car clubs.