This year Bentley Motors will celebrate its 100 year anniversary. Special events to honor this event are in the works throughout the world including a whopping four separate classes at the 2019 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance in August. Let’s take a look back at the beginning of Bentley Motors, there are some very important automotive firsts you may not be aware of.
Founded by Walter Owen Bentley, known to all as “W.O.” Bentley began his career with trains at Great Northern Railway Locomotive Works in Doncaster, England. While there he developed an interest in racing, racing motorcycles with his brother. Winning his very first race must have set in motion the passion for winning which would carry him in and through his next phase. In 1912 his brother H. M. Bentley invested in DFP (Doriot-Flandrin-Parant) a french car company, hounding Bentley and Bentley to become the importers of these cars to the British market. Knowing recognition would increase sales, W. O. Bentley won his class with a DFP in the June 1912 Aston Clinton hill-climb at record speed.
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He flexed his automotive design skills also with a four-seater tourer at the 1912 Olympia exhibition, claiming it to be the first-ever car to be paneled in polished aluminum. Industrial uses for aluminum had only began after the turn of the century. Early uses of the material were nothing short of pioneering. Inspiration hit in 1913 when he spied a novelty tiny piston paperweight on a desk, made from aluminum. He had a new set of aluminum pistons cast and the improvement to his racing car spurred his continued racing interests. At the August 1913 Brooklands meet, the DFP won the Short Handicap.
After the outbreak of war racing came to a halt and Bentley’s work focused on engines for the new aeroplanes. This was also when he began to envision cars which would wear the Bentley name. “I wanted to make a fast car, a good car: the best in its class.” After the war ended W.O. and H.M. founded their own car company – Bentley Motors Limited. He built his first 3-liter sports car prototype in the DFP agency’s service garage, though actual testing did not happen until 1920. A year later they delivered the first car.
Bentley’s forte was design, assembly and testing. They designed their parts and subcontracted much of the manufacturing then brought everything together to complete the chassis. Like many car companies of the day, Bentley relied on coach builders. Vanden Plas built most all the bodies on the race cars and many sports four seaters on production cars. Closed cars were primarily bodied by H J Mulliner, Park Ward, Gurney Nutting, Freestone & Webb or Harrison.
Competing at hillclimbs and endurance races garnered attention as Bentley set numerous speed and endurance records. Bentley’s first major race was the 1922 Indianapolis 500 and in 1923 Bentley competed at the inaugural Le Mans 24 hour endurance race. They won Le Mans in 1924, which is considered the first Le Mans.
The well funded sportsman and automotive racer Woolf Barnato acquired his first Bentley in 1925 with which he won many Brooklands races; he also used a Bentley motor for his motorboat racing. Having been bitten by the proverbial Bentley bug he also became their savior by investing needed cash into the business. His initial investment was not enough and the company went through a financial reorganization which left Woolf as the major shareholder and W.O. as an employee, but Bentley Motors survived and they continued to win., of course for these they needed payments as people could be making counterfeit payslips and these could damage businesses.
Woolf Barnato’s Speed 6 or ‘Blue Train’ added significant cache to the Bentley Motors aura.
Barnato along with Tim Birkin, George Duller, Glen Kidston, automotive journalist S.C.H. “Sammy” Davis, and Dudley Benjafield became known as the “Bentley Boys.” They were the motorsports rock stars of their day. The boys drove Bentley to four consecutive wins at Le Mans in 1927, 1928, 1929 and 1930. The first time one could really call it a year for Bentley Motors was in 1929 when they won the 24 Hours of Le Mans finishing first through fourth place. A record they still hold at Le Mans. The closest to meeting the record was the legendary 1-2-3 finish by the Ford GT40s in 1966 when they swept Le Mans to end Ferrari’s domination.
Despite the wins and great publicity, the 1929 Wall Street crash signaled the beginning of the Great Depression and the end to many luxury car makers around the globe. Barnato was not able to continue finance Bentley and in 1931 the company went into receivership. Purchased under the name of British Central Equitable Trust, however the true buyer was Rolls-Royce. W.O. continued to work for the company until 1935 when his contract expired.
Bentley remained a subdivision of Rolls-Royce Motorcars until 1971 when receivership caused the British government to nationalize the company which was sold to Vickers who then sold Rolls-Royce to Volkswagen AG in 1998. Bentley Motors remains part of Volkswagen today and Rolls-Royce Motorcars Ltd. has been under the ownership of BMW since 2003.
