William Morris, 1st Viscount Nuffield
William Morris, 1st Viscount Nuffield (1877-1963). British industrialist and philanthropist. The son of a farm labourer, he started work at 15. He set up a bicycle repair shop, extending it to motorcycles and, later, to cars. In 1912 he founded the company Morris Motors Ltd at Cowley, near Oxford, producing his first Morris Oxford car in 1913. His business was successful and he concentrated on producing cars as cheaply as possible. The first MG sports car was produced in 1923. Following the merger of Morris Motors with the Austin Motor Company (1952), his company became the third largest car-manufacturer in the world. He gave much of his wealth to charity and founded Nuffield College, Oxford, and the Nuffield Foundation.
