Samuel Holbrook Ltd.

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Samuel Holbrook Ltd. (initially: Holbrook & Taylors Ltd. ) was a British manufacturer of automobile bodies .

Company history

Lanchester Ten Dorchester 4-light Saloon by Holbrook (ca.1935)
Alvis Silver Eagle with Holbrook superstructure (1935)

The company was named after Samuel Holbrook. Holbrook had been a sales manager at Austin before going freelance in early 1930 and working for L. & L. Taylor Ltd. , a specialist in commercial vehicle bodies in Wolverhampton . The company was named Holbrook & Taylors Ltd. reorganized. Despite an initial announcement that it would remain active in the commercial vehicle sector, the company presented special bodies for cars at the Olympia Motor Show in London that same year : a convertible sedan ( All-Wheather Saloon ) for Hillman and a sports sedan called Sportsman's Saloon for Invicta . Until 1937, the company regularly presented its bodies at the London Motor Show in Olympia and Earls Court .

In 1933 the Taylor family withdrew from the company. A reorganization followed under the name Samuel Holbrook Ltd. with new partners. In the years that followed, Holbrook built a number of other all-weather saloons for Hillman and was able to work with Alvis . Attractive sedans were created for a number of models of this brand. Holbrook named the design Dorchester and sold variants of it to Crossley , Lanchester , Singer , Standard and Wolseley ; at Vauxhall it was listed as Suffolk and at BSA as Varsity .

Holbrook tried to expand the field of business and began to manufacture special bodies for luxury automobiles from around 1935. The company managed to be included in the circle of bodybuilders recommended by Rolls-Royce , which did not result in enough orders in the long term. After a last attempt with bodies for buses and coaches, including in cooperation with the motorcycle manufacturer AJS , failed, the only way to go was bankruptcy. Samuel Holbrook Ltd. closed its doors in 1938.

literature

  • Walker, Nick: AZ of British Coachbuilders, 1919-1960 ; Bay View Books, Bideford, Devon, UK (1997), ISBN 1-870979-93-1 (English)

Web links

Commons : Samuel Holbrook Coachbuilder  - Collection of Pictures, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Description and illustrations of an Alvis Silver Eagle SG Saloon with Holbrook superstructure (accessed on May 10, 2016).