by Ross Finlay (22 Oct 03)

The death after a short illness of Peter Morgan, chairman and joint (with his son Charles) managing director of Morgan Motor Company, means that the world of car manufacturing has lost one of its most gentlemanly characters.
Still going strong in his 84th year, and until just a few weeks ago turning up at the Malvern factory every working day, Peter Morgan was the doyen of the British motor industry, and it was always a pleasure to see him strolling around motor shows, encountering old friends and stopping for a chat at other companies' stands.

Anybody unfamiliar with the motoring scene might have thought he was just an amiable old chap playing some supporting role. But the amazing thing is that, as well as being the head of the world's only independent motor manufacturing company to have continued in the same uninterrupted family ownership since Edwardian times, he was only the second chairman of the firm since his father founded it in 1909.

In the world motor industry, Peugeot and Ford are the only companies with a longer history which still (or in Ford's case, again) have a member of the founding family at top board level, although they have to cope with a multiplicity of shareholders. In Morgan's case, Charles takes over as only the third chairman in 94 years.

Morgan has always been at Malvern, although the present factory in Pickersgill Road is the second site it has occupied there. Its connection with the town goes right back to Morgan's pre-commercial days, because Peter's father Henry Frederick Stanley Morgan (always HFS in motoring history books) built his prototype three-wheeler in one of the Malvern College workshops.

Not Quite The First In Name Or Place

Oddly enough, there had been a previous Morgan car company elsewhere in England, but it went out of business before HFS started. And his Morgan wasn't the first car to be built in Malvern, although the 1890's Santler rarely gains even a footnote in the reference books.

All Morgans were three-wheelers until the mid-1930s, when government concessions which reduced the cost of running cars of that kind were removed. HFS produced his first four-wheeler in 1936, but there are still many enthusiasts for the old three-wheelers around. With two wheels at the front and one at the back - the only sensible layout - and a V-twin motor-cycle engine between the front pair, a sports Morgan was a familiar competition machine.

As Peter was to do later with four-wheeled Morgans, HFS competed regularly in trials and rallies with three-wheeled cars. One of the many Morgan illustrations in Donald Cowbourne's British Trials Drivers: Their cars and awards, 1919 to 1928 shows HFS and his wife storming up the phenomenally steep public road climb at Diabaig in Wester Ross during the 1924 Scottish Six Days Trial.

Morgan moved to four wheels in 1936, but there was still great affection for the three-wheelers. A friend of mine drove one in Edinburgh during his student days, and would occasionally cause a certain amount of alarm and despondency by holding out his right arm to signal a turn, only for the car to go straight on, its front wheels running exactly in the tramlines.

Morgan At Le Mans

Peter joined the firm, of course, and took over when his father died, after a very long innings, in 1959. He supervised the moves through various engine suppliers - right up to BMW for the current Aero 8 - and many of Morgan's competition victories, including that famous class win at Le Mans in 1962.

He enjoyed the fact that Morgan went back to Le Mans for a 40th-anniversary race in 2002, but like many of us, even with no direct Morgan connections, was extremely displeased that the Le Mans organisers turned down the Morgan entry this year.

Never mind. He lived long enough to relish Morgan's runner-up position in the 2003 British GT Championship, and to know that there's a Morgan entry for the Bathurst 24-Hour Race next month in Australia.

As well as being right in the heart of Elgar country, Malvern is very much a Morgan town, with visitors welcomed to the factory, and a pub named after the car. It always seems typically English that in separate locations Malvern can happily accommodate technologies of two entirely different eras - advanced radar research and the building of ash-framed sports cars with louvres down the bonnet in the best post-vintage thoroughbred style.

Back to Ross Finlay column index