Cecil Kimber

Cecil Kimber (born April 12, 1888 in Dulwich , † February 4, 1945 in London ) was co-founder and long-time managing director of the English sports car manufacturer MG (MG Car Company, formerly "Morris Garages").

Life

Kimber's personal history is closely linked to the MG automobile company, which he co-founded. Kimber kicked motorsport enthusiastic youth and first steps in business administration and automotive designer in 1921 in the services of William Morris (later Lord Nuffield, this controlled over Austin Morris in the 1950s and 1960s, much of the British automobile production) and was managing director of the sales office of Morris Works in Oxford ("Morris Garages").

With his enthusiasm for motorsport and his organizational and creative talent, he designed sporty variants on the technical basis of Morris vehicles, which quickly found friends. The naming of the vehicles of the "Morris Garages" in the hillclimb and trial competitions, which were very popular at the time, quickly brought the small company nationwide popularity, especially since the designer Kimber liked to drive himself and with great success. Due to the low price, MG vehicles quickly became the common man's sports car and were sold in relatively large numbers. The MG factory expanded rapidly, and under Kimbers management, the new factory in Abingdon was moved in 1929 , in which the MG Car Company produced until 1981 .

His constant advocacy of motorsport activities and his strict insistence on high-tech vehicles put Kimber out of favor with his superiors in the late 1930s because of the high costs involved . Kimber found it increasingly difficult to enforce his technical standards. In the last full year of production before the war , MG finally produced more sedans than sports cars. With the beginning of the Second World War, the MG factory was also converted to war production. Kimber's task was now mainly to procure armaments contracts in order to preserve his company the independence he wanted - the goal for him was to be able to resume sports car production after the war.

Due to disagreements with the Nuffield management, Kimber left MG in 1941 and then coordinated war production at Charlesworths, a former bus manufacturer. He later became factory director at Specialloid Pistons.

Kimber did not live to see MG after the war; he died on February 4, 1945 during a business trip to London in a railway accident.

literature

• MG by McComb, published by Osprey Automotive, 1978
• Brian Laban: MGB - The Model History, Transpress, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-344-70774-4 .