MECCANO THE EARLY YEARS

Ask any adult male today if he possessed a Meccano Set when he was a boy and nine out of ten will say yes. Meccano must be the oldest toy on the market today that has enjoyed uninterrupted progress since its inception 98 years ago.

To give the period that Meccano has been in existence some sort of time scale consider the following:

When the original patent was taken out in 1901 for "Mechanics Made Easy" (this was the name Frank Hornby first gave to his invention) Paul Kruger was President of the Republic, Queen Victoria was Queen of England and Theodore Roosevelt President of the United States of America, (the same president who Teddy Bears are named after).
And that was a long time ago.

The complete history of Meccano has been written by two Englishmen, Jim Gamble and Bert Love in a 432 page book called "The Meccano System" published by Cavendish Books. This story is somewhat condensed but the full story is contained in the above book.

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inven1.jpg (28603 bytes) Surprisingly enough, although Frank Hornby was responsible for the invention and production of the worlds most famous toy based on engineering principles, he had no formal engineering training what-so-ever. He was in fact in the wholesale provision trade in Liverpool. Born on the 15th of May 1863, Frank Hornby was the son of John Hornby, a provision merchant.

Frank Hornby married the daughter of a customs officer on the 15th of January 1887 when they were both 24 years of age. His father died in the same year. With the closure of his father's business Frank Hornby became a bookkeeper with David Hugh Elliot who ran a meat importing business in Liverpool.

Hornby's first child, Roland Godefroy Hornby, was born on 12th June 1889 and his second, Douglas Egerton Hornby, was born on the 31st of December 1890. Both were to become Directors of "Meccano Ltd" in due course.

Frank Hornby was always trying out new ideas in his home workshop with his two sons. When his eldest son Roland was about 10 years old Frank Hornby was making toys from sheet metal cut by hand. Frank Hornby was a very determined man and was sustained by the writings of Samual Smiles in his book "Self Help". The book is about famous Victorian businessmen who struggled and yet triumphed in the face of overwhelming difficulty. The book "Self Help" was first published in the 1800's and is still published today in paperback form.

The models Frank Hornby built for his sons from metal strips were complete models of bridges, trucks, cranes with no really interchangeable parts. Frank Hornby gave this a great deal of thought and finally decided to make separate parts that could be bolted together to make various models. This was the breakthrough and the idea that eventually made him a millionaire.

He decided on strips half an inch wide with holes spaced at half inch intervals and these cut by hand from copper sheet. Originally he made his own screws but later found a source of supply. These same half inch measurements are still in use today.

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Frank Hornby was also an amateur photographer and fortunately took photographs of some of his early models, some of which are reproduced in the book "The Meccano System".

By the end of 1900 Frank Hornby had developed a set of parts and was now considering marketing them. Frank Hornby took advice and patented his invention but to enable him to do this he had to borrow five pounds from his employer, David Hugh Elliot. The patent was for "Improvements in Toy or Educational Devices for Children and Young People" and this was lodged with the patents office on 9th January 1901.

During 1901 Frank Hornby started looking for companies to manufacture his product. His troubles were just about start as he still had a family to support on a small wage and a full time job to do. He had to find time to hawk his product to shops and wholesalers and received more disappointments than orders.

His system looked very crude and was poorly finished. A man with less determination would have given up at this point. At this time his employer started to get interested in what Frank Hornby was doing and offered him some empty premises next to the office where he worked. At this point Elliot and Hornby became partners.
Frank Hornby now decided to write to professor Hele-Shaw, a highly qualified academic who was Head of the Engineering Department at Liverpool University, sending him some photographs and details of his construction toy which he now called "Mechanics Made Easy". This was a brilliant move and the favourable reply from professor Hele-Shaw was used extensively by Frank Hornby to advertise his product to great effect proclaiming its virtues.

The next six years were to be a constant struggle for Frank Hornby and but for his partner's financial help his endeavours could well have ended here. Throughout those six difficult years many new parts were introduced and many new patents taken out. Sales of sets had been good over the 1902 Christmas period, mostly through Phillip, Son & Nephew, a Liverpool based scientific apparatus dealer with branches in Stoke- on-Trent and London. 1500 sets were sold in 1903 but it was still not a profitable year. Three gears were introduced in 1903, the first to be included in "Mechanics Made Easy" sets. This was a major step forward in the development of the system.
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 In 1904 a new range of sets was available, for December. There were now six available, still packed in tin boxes, and the instruction manual was in French and English. 1905 saw the introduction of two more sets and by 1906 a small profit was made although no wages had yet been taken by either partner and the investments were barely covered by the assets.

1907 saw an increase in advertising and two large London stores, Gamages and the Army and Navy Stores, were now stocking the product and it was featured in their catalogues. Another problem now arose. For the previous six years Frank Hornby had relied upon outside manufacturers for his supply of parts for the sets, but the quantities now forthcoming were insufficient for his needs and the quality was not up to his standards. Accordingly Frank Hornby decided to manufacture his own parts. By this time the number of different parts available had risen from 16 to 36.
In 1907 Frank Hornby gave up his job with Elliot and set out to find suitable premises. He found a workshop at 10 Duke Street, Liverpool, and secured a three year lease on it. He realised that he would have to raise capital in order to purchase suitable machinery and provide wages for skilled staff. In view of their past record Hornby and Elliot were granted a loan and by June 1907 they were manufacturing their own parts for the system. Their sales for the financial year ending 31st of March were 3,000 pounds.

A very significant move was now made by Frank Hornby and one which was to be felt to this day. On the 14th September 1907 Hornby registered his famous trade mark "MECCANO". Business was increasing all the time and Frank Hornby realised that he would have to raise more capital in order to invest in a larger factory and more plant. Although he had registered the Meccano name, Hornby and Elliot were still trading in their own names and it was obvious that a company had to be formed. Various businessmen and Hornby's bankers were approached and seven members signed the Certificate of Incorporation as a company on June the 4th 1908.

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 This company was sold on June the 17th 1908 but although Frank Hornby's partner, David Hugh Elliot did sign the agreement of sale he did not join the new company and disappeared from the scene. Frank Hornby received the following:
Debenture shares worth 2,400 pounds. Ordinary 1 pound shares 4,000 pounds, a sizeable amount of money in 1908. The new "MECCANO LIMITED" started trading officially at midnight on the 30th of May 1908.

In 1909 Frank Hornby manufactured the one and only (even to this day) educational set. This was the "Hornby System of Mechanical Demonstration". Three sets were marketed together with a 44 page manual. All the dimensions for parts in the manual were in centimeters. In the back of the manual, Hornby describes the Metric system, a system which is still being enforced in many countries. This educational system was not a commercial success and was discontinued after five years.

It is a great pity that the present day MECCANO company does not channel some of its resources into investigating the teaching possibilities of MECCANO.

It was in 1910 that the famous "MECCANO" logo was commissioned, and turnover for the financial year was 12,000 pounds.

Up until 1911 clips had been used to secure wheels and gears to axles, now set screws were used for the first time.

Throughout these early years exports had continued to grow, on the 3rd August 1912 Frank Hornby applied to form a new company in France, together with his son Roland who was now 23 years of age and a manager. The French address was 17, Rue Blueue, Paris, at the same time he opened a German office in Berlin.

In 1912 the first clockwork motors appeared but these were manufacture by Marklin of Germany. There were two motors, No.1 was a standard size but the No.2 was a very large motor 21.5 x 14 cms, it had three spindles, one fitted with a clutch mechanisms and two detachable spindles which could be fitted with 20 or 25 teeth spindles.

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 It was in 1913 that Frank Hornby realised that the present factory at 274 West Derby Road just didn't have sufficient capacity for the ever increasing demand for Meccano and that he would have to find larger premises. Instead of taking over an existing factory he found a large plot in Old Swan (a district of Liverpool) and which had the famous Binns Road as one of its boundaries.

By the autumn of 1914 the Binns Road Factory was in full production. Two items were introduced in 1914 and these were a Water Motor and a Large Mains Electric motor, neither of these items lasted long and were soon discontinued.

1914 saw the outbreak of World War 1 and with it supplies of clockwork motors from Germany ceased, Frank Hornby then manufactured his own No.1 clockwork motor at the new Binns Road factory and introduced two low voltage electric motors (4 volt) which it is said were manufactured for Frank Hornby by the American Lionel Company. Reversing and non reversing motors were available.
1916 was the first year that the Meccano Magazine was launched but this was in America and for the American market it was known as the Meccano Engineer, this was the August-September issue and was one month ahead of the English version.
The first copies of the Meccano Magazine were given away free but in 1918 readers were asked for 2 pence to pay for postage for four copies. In 1920 a charge of 1 pence per copy was made and this lasted until 1923. The official Meccano Magazine ceased publication in 1980.

Many Meccano clubs were now in existence and Frank Hornby saw the advantage of organizing these clubs under the Meccano company wing. To enable him to do this the Meccano Guild was formed in Sep-Oct 1919. Members would receive a membership certificate and a badge, Meccano club leaders would receive a leaders badge.

Many, many new developments took place in the years 1918 to 1926 with the introduction of many of the circular parts but far too numerous to mention here. A very important one to the Meccano Company was the introduction of Hornby Trains in 1920. In 1926 a change took place, that of colour, up until this period Meccano had been manufactured in a Nickel finish, the change was heralded as "THE NEW MECCANO" but as far as colour goes only a few parts were Red and Pea-Pod Green, but by 1927 all Meccano parts, with a few exceptions, were Red & Green.

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 1927 & 1928 saw the introduction of another wonderful list of new Meccano parts which included the Geared Roller Bearing.

34 Super Model Leaflets became available in 1929 some were very good super models but some were not so super. Two very important and informative books were published by Meccano and these are "Standard Mechanisms" (1929) and "How To Use Meccano Parts" (1931) these are still standards in their own right and the information therein applies equally today as it did 65 years ago.

In September 1931 Frank Hornby was elected member of parliament for the Everton ward of Liverpool.
The First Meccano Aeroplane outfits were manufactured in 1931 and the Meccano Motor Car outfits followed in 1932 together with Hornby Speedboats.

A cheap construction set known as "Trix" was being sold in the shops, to combat the sale of these cheap sets Meccano manufactured its own low cost set which was known as the "X Series". Two more products not connected with the Meccano construction system appeared in 1933, these were the "Elektron" and "Kemex" outfits.

The famous "Dinky Toys" were introduced in 1934.

A new era started in 1934 with another change of colours to Blue and Gold, the advertisements claimed "Brighter and Better". Yet another new product was launched in 1934, namely "Dinky Builder".

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 A new edition of "How To Use Meccano Parts" now named "Meccano Parts and How To Use Them" was published in 1935 and following this a new version of "Standard Mechanisms" was issued in 1936.

Frank Hornby died in September 1936 at the age of 72 of a chronic heart condition complicated by diabetics.

Another very famous brand name was to come from the Hornby stable in 1938 that of Hornby Dublo Trains.

The last product to be launched before the outbreak of the second world war in 1939 was the "Mechanised Army" outfit. Parts were finished in a matt khaki, a three part wooden gun barrel was included, with many standard parts having less holes punched in them.

This short history is very condensed and only covers the years 1901 to 1939, although the remaining history is not so pioneering as the early years it is still a very interesting story and covers more years than those already written about