Recollections of former Land Rover Chief Engineer

The Heritage Motor Centre, welcomed a visit by one of Land Rover’s former Chief Engineers from the 1940′s. Arthur Goddard, aged 88, travelled from his home in Australia to visit the HMC on 29 April for the first time. From 1948 – 1956, Arthur was Assistant Chief Engineer at Rover in Solihull and led the team of engineers who developed the iconic Land Rover. Arthur was also responsible for developing the ceremonial Land Rover for the Queen’s Commonwealth tour.

Born in Cheshire, Arthur has lived in Australia since 1971 and still works as Chief Engineer of his own engineering company. Land Rover enthusiasts, Michael Bishop and Alex Massey, re-discovered Arthur through their own detective work, with help from the Heritage Motor Centre’s archives.

During his visit, Arthur spoke about his memories of working at Rover’s Solihull factory in the late 40′s/early 50′s. Arthur recalls one of his more difficult tasks was to develop the ceremonial Land Rover for the Queen’s Commonwealth tour: -

“There was an order from the Palace for about 40 of them. Tickfords had an order placed on them for the body. They had made a throne, a massive thing, like Rule Britannia on a penny.we thought we could do better. We were asked to visit Holyrood Palace (sic) in Edinburgh very early one morning, to present our special Land Rover to Her Majesty. We parked it on the lawn and then some French windows opened and The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh appeared.they thought it was marvellous”.

These recollections were recorded for the Land Rover Legacy Project, being undertaken by the Heritage Motor Centre’s Archive team, with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and Jaguar Land Rover. The project will create a dedicated archive resource about Land Rover and the factory at Solihull, for the general public. It is anticipated that an exhibition will be launched next year.

Arthur was able to see historical photographs, Land Rover production records and “Huey”, the first pre-production Land Rover, that are part of the museum’s collection. As a souvenir of the visit, Arthur was presented with a die cast model of “Huey” and a DVD featuring Land Rover footage from museum’s archives.