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Motoring and the British Countryside

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2010

DAVID JEREMIAH
DAVID JEREMIAH*
Affiliation:
Department of History of Art, University of Bristol, 11 Woodland Road, Clifton, Bristol BS8 1TB, UK Faculty of Arts, University of Plymouth, Drake Circus, Plymouth, Devon, PL4 8AA, UK
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Abstract

The representation of the car in the countryside was central to selling the benefits of motoring and owning a car in the interwar period. Motor traffic was a key part of the debate and legislation on the countryside, in the context of land for building and food production, and scenery for pleasure and reassurance of what it meant to be English. This essay focuses on the impact of the motor car as it generated a new economy for rural Britain with new services, buildings and roads that changed the landscape and made the countryside more accessible. It shows how the motoring press and advertising campaigns exploited an imagined ‘Beautiful Britain’ and brought about a modernisation that set in place aspects of the use, values and culture of the British countryside that have remained to the present.

Type
Research Article
Information
Rural History , Volume 21 , Issue 2 , October 2010 , pp. 233 - 250
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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References

Notes

1. The 1865 Locomotives on Highways Act for steam traction had set down three people to be responsible for the vehicle, with one walking in front with a red flag. This had been relaxed by the 1878 legislation, but it was not until 1896 that the confusion was removed, and, more importantly, in the process the three persons in attendance rule was deleted.

2. There is an extensive list of publications on the history of individual marques, celebrities and stories of events and races and the Library of the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu provides an invaluable source for research. More recently attention has been given to the social history of motoring and amongst these works the following provide much useful material: Brendon, P., The Motoring Century, the Story of the Royal Automobile Club (London, 1997)Google Scholar; Jackson, J., Man and the Automobile, a 20th Century Love Affair (London, 1979)Google Scholar; Jeremiah, D., Representations of British Motoring (Manchester, 2007)Google Scholar; Lambert, J. A. and Baldwin, A., Motoring in Britain 1895–1940 (Toyota, 1998)Google Scholar; O'Connell, S., The Car in British Society (Manchester, 1998)Google Scholar.

3. The major periodicals are the weeklies Autocar, first issued 1895, and The Motor, 1903. Both are important for their reports, commentaries, technical data and illustrations, predominantly for a general readership defined as those of moderate means; Car Illustrated, 1902, for the upper middle-class and aristocratic reader, became Car and Golf in 1922, and merged with Motor Owner in 1928, a monthly periodical for upper middle-class motorists first published in June 1919 and last issued in May 1930.

4. Autocar, 22nd December 1922, p. 1274.

5. See Jeremiah, D., ‘Filling-up: The British Experience, 1896–1940’, Journal of Design History, 8: 2 (1995)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6. See Jeremiah, D., ‘Architecture for the Motor Car’, in Holder, J. and Parissien, S., The Architecture of British Transport in the Twentieth Century (London, 2004)Google Scholar.

7. The Motor, 14th October 1924, p. 512.

8. The Motor, 29th May 1923, p. 709.

9. There was a new Shell campaign on the same theme in 1931 and five years later Shell launched a new campaign based on Britain's landmarks. See Hewitt, J., Shell Poster Book (London, 1998)Google Scholar.

10. Autocar, 3rd July 1925, p. 5.

11. Baldwin, S., On England (London, 1926), p. 7Google Scholar.

12. Abercrombie, P., The Preservation of Rural England: The Control of Development by Means of Rural Planning (Liverpool, 1926), p. 50Google Scholar.

13. Report of the Inaugural Meeting of the Council for the Preservation of Rural England, Journal of The Royal Institute of British Architects, 18th December 1926, pp. 138 – 141; dominated by architects and planners, the Royal Automobile Club and Automobile Association were listed among the founder members.

14. Three articles in Country Life provide a useful note on agriculture as a business: ‘Business Farming’, 17th April 1926, pp. 595–597; ‘A Modern Super-Farm: The Crawley Court Estate’, 7th August 1926, pp. 195–196; ‘On Farm Machinery’, 14th August 1926, pp. 261–262. The articles underlined the importance of the tractor, while the photograph of a glass-lined motor tanker taking on milk at the farm indicates a new scale of production and distribution.

15. Conference on the Preservation of Ancient Cottages, Royal Society of Arts, 26th January 1927.

16. Report, Architect and Building News, 4th February 1927, p. 218.

17. E. Guy Dawber, ‘The inaugural address’, Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, 6th November 1926, pp. 3–10.

18. ‘Rural England Number’, Architects’ Journal, 14th November 1928, is an invaluable introduction to these issues.

19. Autocar, 17th August 1928, p. 324.

20. There is a good outline of the issues and work of the Design and Industries Association and the Council for the Protection of Rural England in Matless, D., Landscape and Englishness (London, 1998)Google Scholar.

21. Building, April 1932, p. 172.

22. Seeing Britain from an Austin (London, mid-1920s).

23. Kipling, R., Beauty Spots (London, 1931), p. 11Google Scholar.

24. Rumbold, G., The Wayside Book (London, 1934)Google Scholar.

25. The Motor, 29th December 1931, p. 1018.

26. Autocar, 23rd November 1934, p. 968.

27. Autocar, 1st October 1937.

28. Cornish, V., The Preservation of our Scenery (London, 1937)Google Scholar reinforced the idea that the national character was formed by the countryside and that its preservation was essential to the national well-being.