National Motor Museum Motoring Archives
- Advice on accessing these materials
- Archives Hub Features
- Related Resources
- Web
- Telephone
- +44 (0)1590 614650
- Address
- National Motor Museum, Beaulieu, Brockenhurst SO42 7ZN, England, UK
- Opening Hours
- Tuesday-Friday 10:00-13:00/14:00-17:00 / Closed over the Christmas period
- Archival and Other Holdings
The Motoring Archives hold approximately 300 collections connected with the history of motoring in Great Britain and internationally. They include advertisements, artwork, business records, clippings, correspondence, indentures, diaries, menus, photographs, scrapbooks and technical papers. The Archives support the National Motor Museum’s other collections and are well used as part of the Research and Enquiries Service.
- History
The first Montagu Motor Museum was opened in 1956, and was relocated to enlarged and improved accommodation by 1959. The National Motor Museum Trust was established in 1969, and the renamed National Motor Museum opened in 1972. Collecting had begun in 1952 when the enterprising Edward, 3rd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu opened his ancestral home Palace House to the public and placed five cars on display in the entrance hall. This was a tribute to his father John Scott Montagu, who had been a motoring pioneer.
Edward Montagu founded the Montagu Museum Reference Library in 1960 based on his father’s collection of motoring books and journals. The Motoring Archives originated within the Reference Library Collection. By 2003, it had become clear that the collections management needs of this growing resource could not be properly met by considering them an aspect of the Reference Library, and the Archives became a Collection in their own right.
- Accident Research papers
- Apprenticeship records
- Batten collection
- Beardmore Motors Collection
- Bedford Vehicles collection
- Bluebird Collection
- Bradley collection
- Cecil Burney collection
- Celia Savage collection
- Dunlop and Bluebird Papers
- Electric vehicles
- Frank Churchill collection
- Frederick William Barnes collection
- George Eyston collection
- George Henry Butcher collection
- Goldie Gardner collection
- Greville K Dawson collection
- J H Knight collection
- John Frederick Russell collection
- Lilian Roper collection
- Miller collection
- The Motoring Diaries of Alfred Charles Roe
- Pearson & Cox collection
- Percy Lambert collection
- Peter Collins Collection
- Riley collection
- Roberts Collection
- Ronnie Adams Collection
- Royal Safari papers
- Sir Henry Segrave collection
- Struben Parking System
- Vaughan collection
- Vehicle Builders & Repairers Association (VBRA) collection
- Vivien Bowkley Collection
- Whitehouse collection
- Worthington Brothers collection