A superb
and rare photo, of the Royal Enfield motorcycles in 1934 during a press photo
shoot.
Royal
Enfield was the brand of the Enfield
Cycle Company, an English engineering company. Most famous for producing
motorcycles, they also produced bicycles, lawnmowers, stationary engines, and
even rifle parts for the Royal Small Arms Factory in Enfield Lock. This legacy
of weapons manufacture is reflected in the logo, a cannon, and their motto
"Made like a gun, goes like a bullet". It also enabled the use of the
brand name Royal Enfield from 1890. In 1955 Enfield of India started assembling
Bullet motorcycles under licence from UK components, and by 1962 were
manufacturing complete bikes. The original Redditch,
Worcestershire-based company dissolved in 1970, but Enfield of India, based in
Chennai, continued, and bought the rights to the Royal Enfield name in 1995.
Royal Enfield
production continues, and now Royal Enfield is considered the oldest motorcycle
model in the world still in production and Bullet is the longest production run
model. About 1890, Townsend got himself into a bit of financial trouble. He
called in some financiers from Birmingham,
but they didn't quite see eye to eye so Townsend parted ways with the
financiers leaving the company to them. The financiers then appointed R. W.
Smith & Albert Eadie to take control of Townsend's in November 1891. The
following year the company was rechristened as "The Eadie Manufacturing
Company Ltd". Soon, Albert Eadie got a profitable contract to supply
precision rifle parts to the Royal Small Arms Factory in Enfield, Middlesex. To celebrate the
contract, Eadie and Smith decided to call their new design of bicycle the
"Enfield".
A new company was created to market these new design bicycles called "The
Enfield Manufacturing Co. Ltd", in
October 1892. The next year, the word "Royal" (after the Royal Small
Arms Factory) was added to the company name and thus the Royal Enfield began.
Their trademark, "Made Like A Gun" appeared in 1893. The first
automotive vehicles with the Royal Enfield name were produced in 1898 - a
quadricycle with a De Dion-Bouton 2.75 hp engine. This appears to be the first
motorised example of what we now refer to as "ATV's" or "Quad's".
In 1901 came the Motor Bicycle with a 150 cc 1.5 hp (1 kW) engine
above the front wheel. In 1902 a similar contraption appeared with an Enfield engine of
239 cc 2.75 hp (2 kW). In 1910 came the first of the famous Enfield V-twins, first
with Motosacoche 344 cc 2.75 hp (2 kW) engines, later with Enfield's own engine.
Until World War I the big twins with 770 cc six hp J.A.P. engines and
after WWI 976 cc eight hp Vickers-Wolseley engines. In 1915 came the first
of the small two stroke 225 cc engines, starting with model 200. The
company merged with Alldays & Onions in 1907 and produced cars called
Enfield-Allday until 1925. The First World War began in 1914. Royal Enfield was called on to
supply motorcycles to the British war department and even awarded a contract to
build bikes for the Imperial Russian Government during the same period. The
machine gun combination and the 6 hp (4.5 kW) stretcher-carrying
outfit were some of the models produced for the war purpose. Enfield started using its own engines, a 225
cc two-stroke single and a 425 cc V-twin about this time. In 1917, the officers
of the woman's police force were issued with a 2.1\4 RE 2 stroke. The models of
this period featured 600 cc, inlet-over-exhaust closed valve gear, hand
operated oil pump, two speed countershaft gearbox and chain final drive. The
1915 make in-line 3 cylinder 2 stroke prototype was the world's first with this
configuration and engine type. They also made the only known two seater car,
the Enfield "Autolette" made in 1914, complete with four cylinder
engine with a bore and stroke 59x100mm with a cubic capacity of 1,093 cc. and
delivers 9 horsepower (6.7 kW). Other rare examples include the four
seater four stroke and a two seater two stroke. The Enfield Autocar Company
Ltd. of Hunt End Works in Redditch was formed
in 1906 to handle the car making activities of the Enfield Cycle Company. In
the early 20th century they moved to Sparkbrook after being taken over by
Alldays and Onions Ltd. The interwar year was a period when the sidecar reached
its zenith. The year 1924 saw the launch of the first Enfield four-stroke 350 cc single using a JAP
engine. In 1928, Royal Enfield adopted saddle tanks and centre-spring girder
front forks, one of the first companies to do so.
This is
a very nice and very rare non period photo that reflects a wonderful era
of 1950s motorcycle history in a wonderful way. This is your rare chance to
own this photo, therefore it is printed in a nice large format of ca.
8" x 10" (ca. 20 x 26 cm). It makes it perfectly suitable for
framing!
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