History
Scammell started as a late-Victorian period wheelwright and coach-building business, G Scammell & Nephew Ltd in Spitalfields, London. George Scammell, the founder was joined by his nephew Richard and Richard's sons, Alfred and James. By the early 1900s, the firm had become financially stable, providing maintenance to customers of Foden steam wagons. One such customer, Edward Rudd, had imported a Knox Automobile tractor from the United States, and impressed with its low weight/high hauling power had asked Scammell if they could make a similar model of their own.
However, the outbreak of war in 1914 stopped the project and presented itself as a turning point in road transport history. Mechanical transport was seen to work, proving its vast potential beyond doubt to forward-thinking companies such as Scammell. George Scammell's great nephew, Lt Col Alfred Scammell, was injured and invalided out of the army, and he was able to apply the practical experience he had gained during the war and began developing the articulated six wheeler. Percy G Hugh, chief designer, conceived the idea and at the 1920 Commercial Motor Show 50 orders were taken for the new design. The vehicle's very low axle weight allowed it to carry 7.5 tonnes (8.3 tons) payload legally at 12 miles per hour (19 km/h), rather than being limited to 5 mph.
Read more about this topic: Scammell
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Every literary critic believes he will outwit history and have the last word.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“The history of literature—take the net result of Tiraboshi, Warton, or Schlegel,—is a sum of a very few ideas, and of very few original tales,—all the rest being variation of these.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I feel as tall as you.”
—Ellis Meredith, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 14, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)