Car Articles

It was not much before the First World War that the car major Rolls Royce, which held the key for the future of cars, was introduced. The company shares its name with its founders, Charles Rolls and Henry Royce. The beginning of the great saga of development, technology, and invention can be traced back to 1904, as it was in this year that Henry Royce built his first motor car, Royce 10. When his new invention was introduced to Charles Rolls, owner of C.S.Rolls & Co., a company that sold cars in London, it staged the beginning of a new world for cars. Rolls liked the Royce 10 and in 1904, the first car of the Rolls Royce, Rolls Royce 10hp, was launched at the Paris Salon. Rolls took over all the cars that were later produced by Royce and within two years time both the men knew what was to be done and in 1906 a public share offer was made to collect money to build a factory and buy tools. By 1908 the Rolls-Royce Limited was officially launched. The company never built bodies for its cars; they were built by specialist coachbuilders till 1959.

Claude Johnson, the Commercial Managing Director of the company, who had a very important position in the company and so often referred to as the connecting factor, the hyphen between Rolls and Royce, was successful in winning over the directors to take the decision to discontinue any old models and come up with new ones, which proved to be an important choice in the history of the company as it helped the company increase its sales. Initially the Rolls Royce models didn’t have the mascot on its hood, and it was Johnson who became the medium to bring in the ‘Spirit of Ecstasy’. The Spirit of Ecstasy is the mascot of Rolls-Royce that shows a lady leaning forwards who eyes to the distance and has outstretched her hands, a true embodiment the Spirit of Rolls Royce. The Spirit of Ecstasy, the official mascot of Rolls Royce was initially The Whisper, the personal mascot of Lord Montagu. But there are two Rolls-Royce which does not carry The Spirit of Ecstasy on its hood, and they are both Phantom IVs, one owned by Queen Elizabeth and another by Princess Margaret, which has St. George and Pegasus, respectively, as the mascot.

As a result of thoughtful revival, the company in 1911 launched the Silver Ghost, a car with excellence oozing out in endless proportions. The company tasted its real victory with this model which bought an excellent reputation for it. The demand for the Silver Ghost was so high that the company had to open a new factory in Springfield which bought out a further 1,700 plus cars. The company maintained the one model policy until 1922, but had to break it to beat the economic slowdown after the Second World War. The company introduced a lower-priced model Rolls-Royce Twenty in 1922.

The company was able to successfully withstand the post First World War and Second World War hitches. Though the company was not doing a healthy business during the war it was still able to sustain without merging with any other companies. The Great Depression also didn’t affect the company and it was during this time that the company made a remarkable acquisition which lasted for a long period. Rolls Royce acquired Bentley that was its rival car maker. Rolls Royce had been till then using red colour for its radiator monogram but the common interest forced it to be changed to black. From a period since it launched its first car in 1906 to 1973, when it became Rolls Royce Motors, the company has launched over twenty cars, and the Silver Cloud, Silver Shadow, Silver Dawn, and Phantom and its series to name a few. But Rolls seems to have been really enchanted with “Silver” and “Phantom”.