William Richard Morris (later Lord Nuffield) was a twentieth century motor manufacturer and later a philanthropist

When and Where was Lord Nuffield Born?

10th October 1877, Worcester.

Family Background:

William Richard Morris later Lord Nuffield was the son of Frederick Morris who became a clerk in Oxford after several speculative journeys to the wild west of the United States of America in attempts to make his fortune and Emily Ann Petter, a farmer’s daughter. Nuffield was the eldest of seven children.

Education:

Church School, Cowley, Oxfordshire which he left at the age of fourteen.

Chronology/Biography of Lord Nuffield:

1880: The Morris family moves to Oxford.

1892: He left School

1893: Lord Nuffield worked at 16 James Street, Oxford as a repairer of bicycles in the shed at the bottom of his father’s garden with the starting capital of £4.

1912: Designed his first car, the bull nosed Morris, at his car repair garage at Longwall Street, Oxford. Large scale production of this car moved to a disused military training college in Hollow Way, Cowley, Oxfordshire.

1913: Introduction of the first Morris Oxford car. He became known as “The English Henry Ford”.

1914: The Cowley factory was turned over to the making of munitions for the war effort during the First World War.

1925: The annual output of motor cars from Cowley was now 56,000.

1926: Lord Nuffield bought Huntercombe Golf Course to indulge his favourite sport.

1928: Had a bad reaction to anaesthetics when he had an operation to remove his appendix and always stored the appendix in a jar in a cupboard on the first floor of his house.

1933: Bought the house Nuffield Place, near Wallingford, as it was near the golf course.

1934: Made a Baron. (Lord Nuffield)

1937: Endowed Nuffield College, Oxford. Set up a Professorship of Anaesthesia at Oxford University as he had always wanted to become a doctor and remembered his traumatic operation of 1928.

1938: Made a Viscount and took the name of Nuffield after the Oxfordshire village he was living in.

1943: The Nuffield foundation was begun with a gift of £10 million in shares from the Morris Motors company. He was to give over £30 million to charity during his life, mainly to medical and scientific causes.

Marriage:

1904 to Elizabeth Anstey.

When and Where did he Die?

22nd August 1963, Nuffield Place, Henley-on-Thames.

Age at Death:

86.

Site of Grave:

Holy Trinity Church, Nuffield, Oxfordshire, England.

Places of Interest:

OXFORDSHIRE:

Nuffield Place, Henley-on-Thames.
Museum of Oxford, St Aldgates, Oxford.