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.