Introduction
In the days before a series of amalgamations reduced the British motor industry to a shadow of its former self, Bexhillians were spoiled for choice when it came to motor dealers and car marques.
A photo exhibition in Bexhill Museum casts fresh light on half-forgotten businesses and long-defunct makes.
Once, the likes of Morris House, Dodson’s, Bexhill Motors, Russell’s, Buck’s, Waghorn’s, Marina Garage and the Black and White were household names in Bexhill while the products of the Austin and Morris factories and those of Hillman and Riley and Standard Triumph puttered along streets that appear near-deserted in the fading photographs.
Museum administrator, Don Phillips, has provided the independent, voluntarily-run establishment with some delightful railway exhibitions in the past. Now he and curator Julian Porter, assisted by volunteers Ken and Mary Bywater, have turned their attentions to the town’s motoring heritage.
For this they have trawled the museum’s photo archive – recently considerably augmented by the Bexhill Observer’s photo files.
Well-wishers donated photos and the museum acquired others from a specialist dealer.
Long ago the Bexhill Motor Mart traded “opposite Bexhill GPO” to quote its advertisement.
Researching the exhibition has demonstrated how individual local business upgraded to larger premises as motoring developed in the inter-war and post-war years.
Don Phillips says the exhibition is an opportunity to put together material gathered from these sources in one display.
“Pulham’s started off in De La Warr Mews (Station Road), which then became Caffyns. Pulham’s moved into Sackville Road and then onto Marina which then became Marina Garage.”
“Buck’s moved from Sackville Road into bigger premises on the opposite side of the road.”
“Mr Sivyer took over Marina Garage from Pulham’s – and so it went on.”
The exhibition fills one wall of the corridor between the museum’s Sargent and Costume and Social History galleries. But gaps remain in the photographic record, gaps that it is hoped that museum supporters might be able to fill.
Don Phillips says: “There are certain garages that it was almost impossible to illustrate. The one which stood on Little Common roundabout is a case in point. We have almost nothing on Russell’s Garage. There are no photos whatever of the former Devonshire Garage in Endwell Road.”
The museum grasped the opportunity when a postcard dealership offered shots of factory-fresh Morris models outside the new Morris House, which was opened, on the corner of Sackville Road and Egerton Road, by Lord Nuffield.
But who now remembers the “Essex Terraplane” cars? For those who don’t, and that’s, probably, most of us, the following may throw some light on what they were!
In 1919, the Hudson Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan introduced into rolex replica their range of vehicles the “Essex”, which was designed for budget-minded buyers and was intended to compete with the more up-market Ford and Chevrolet vehicles. In 1932, it was re-styled and re-named the “Essex Terraplane” – but only for six years as, in 1938,it became the “Hudson 112”.
Index of Garages
