Clarke, Cluley and Co
of Globe Works, Coventry
1884 Company established at Well Street, Coventry as cycle makers by Ernest Clarke and Charles J. Cluley with George Storo Smith and Daniel Blakemore
1896/7 Directory: Listed under cycles. More details
By 1901 they were producing motorcycles and forecars with Minerva, MMC and Sarolea engines
Globe were motorcycles produced from 1901 to 1905. The machines were primitive but in 1904 the firm also offered a model with the Phoenix Trimo forecar or a trailer. Although such fittings were nearing the end of their popularity, the company went ahead. The forecars had a 3.5hp Minerva or Sarolea engine with a water-cooled cylinder head inclined and hung from the downtube. A chain-driven pump circulated the water. A clutch was fitted to the crankshaft and the rear-wheel drive was by belt.
1902 'Clarke, Cluley and Co have on exhibit their 'Globe' motor cycle, in which the 2.25 h.p. motor is set vertically in the specially designed loop frame strongly held by three brackets and provided with a special silencer carried beneath the crank chamber'[1]
1904 Partnership dissolved. '...the Partnership heretofore subsisting between the undersigned, Ernest Clarke. Charles James Cluley, and Daniel Blakemore, carrying on business as Cycle Manufacturers, at the Globe Cycle Works, Well-street, Coventry, under the style or firm of "CLARKE, CLULEY, AND CO.," has been dissolved by mutual consent...'[2]
1906 Partnership dissolved. '...Partnership heretofore subsisting between us the undersigned, Daniel Blakemore and Charles James Cluley, carrying on business as Cycle Manufacturers, at the "Globe Cycle Works," Well-street, Coventry, under the style or firm of "CLARKE CLULEY AND CO.," has been dissolved by mutual consent...'[3]
By 1906 only Cluley was left of the original partners so he then worked with James Florendine and John Raby
1911 Concentrating on cycle production
1912 Listed in Spennell's directory of Coventry as Cycle Manufacturers. [4]
1921-28 Producing cars again. Produced around 2,000 Cluley cars[5]. Design by Cecil Charles Bayliss with assistance from Arthur Alderson
1934 Producing parts for textile machinery
WWII Factory bombed in 1940 and a new one built a year later at Kenilworth
1987 Company closed
See Also
Sources of Information
- [3] MICMA Web Site
- Peck's Trades Directory of Birmingham, 1896-97: Cycles
- Coventry’s Motorcycle Heritage by Damien Kimberley. Published 2009. ISBN 978 0 7509 5125 9
- The British Motorcycle Directory - Over 1,100 Marques from 1888 - by Roy Bacon and Ken Hallworth. Pub: The Crowood Press 2004 ISBN 1 86126 674 X
- The Encyclopedia of the Motorcycle by Peter Henshaw. Published 2007. ISBN 978 1 8401 3967 9