Brief History of the Runwell Cycle Company of Birmingham

Note: There is no official history of the company, and no collection of company records, with the exception of a few scrapbooks at the University of Warwick (UK). Since the author of this article did not have access to these scrapbooks, much of this information has been gathered through Internet research. If you believe any of this information is inaccurate, or if you would like to add something, please feel free to submit corrections or contributions.

For most Britishers, the name Runwell today connotes a mental hospital and community of that name east of London. However, between 1904 and the 1960s, it was also a small bicycle manufacturing firm located in Birmingham. The Runwell Cycle Company produced bicycles of several makes to meet the high domestic and export demand for bicycles in the first half of the twentieth century. By the post-World War II period, the ascendance of major manufacturers like Raleigh, and the declining popularity of bicycling, had forced many smaller companies like Runwell out of existence.

The Runwell Cycle Company was founded by William Henry Jennings (born 1873 in Derby, England). When Jennings was twenty, he moved to Leeds, where he was listed as a “clothier’s traveler.” By 1904, he had moved to Birmingham, where he founded the Runwell Cycle Company on Lawson Street.

Jennings’s granddaughter remembers her grandfather as a kind, generous, and good-hearted man:

My earliest vivid memory of my grandfather is of my grandfather’s 60^th birhday party in London before the war. Grandpa was a member of the Magic Circle and entertained all his small children (grown-ups, too!) with conjuring tricks, to their great delight. During the war, he stayed in London (14 Great Eastern Street) and I visited him there when the war ended.

In 1945 my father had settled in the country in Warwickshire and it was then that grandpa gave me and my brothers a Runwell cycle each, which gave us the much appreciated freedom of being able to roam the countryside during our teen years. Grandpa wrote to us, too, and also gave us very generous birthday presents. I always remember him as being kind and generous and I believe his staff thought this too.

The Runwell Cycle Company started small, but “through sheer hard work and business acumen,” Jennings expanded the business until he had depots and branches in most of Britain’s large towns, and an overseas depot in Java.

One of Jennings’s daughters recalls that:

Father knew all of his workforce by name and never employed anyone who belonged to a Union. There was always a happy atmosphere and we enjoyed going round the factory talking to the people and watching them tune the spokes in the wheels. He used to leave us on the a.m. train and came home twelve hours later and brought work to do on the weekends.

The Runwell company relied on the strength of its bicycle frames and the quality of their construction to sell bicycles, rather than their brand name alone. In their advertising, they advocated quality workmanship and affordability as virtues of a good bicycle. Runwell originally manufactured only bicycles, but by the late 1920s seems to have also begun manufacturing toys and sundries, and by the 1950s had also begun manufacturing parts and accessories for the auto industry. While still focused on building quality bicycles, their earlier advertising claim that, “we concentrate our energies on bicycles alone” fell by the wayside. By the 1960s, the firm was known primarily as a parts and accessories supplier, and no images or examples of advertising could be located after 1961.

The Runwell bicycle in the author’s collection features a distinctive design element of the Runwell brand that was most likely in production in the 1930s: an unusual “rigid safety frame” design that includes an extra angled support connecting the head tube and top tube. Other features of the author’s late 1920s or 1930s model are provided here for reference purposes: rod brake on front wheel, Perry single-speed coaster brake hub on rear wheel, Westwood rims front and back, bottom bracket oiler, hub oilers, 32-spoke front wheel, 40-spoke rear wheel.

I have gathered a gallery of images of Runwell bicycles and advertising here. Hopefully it will grow over time.

*All quotations from original correspondence with Julia Jennings, 28 October 2008.

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The Runwell's History Lessons

Now that the Runwell is up and running again, with only a few things left to finish, I wanted to share a bit of its history, or at least what I can deduce from some its features. I still don't know the date of production, but the 1920s or 1930s still seems right. Apparently, most bikes with the Perry coaster hub were manufactured for sale overseas, but I know that the bike was in England until the previous owner brought it to the U.S. sometime in the 1980s (I think). I also know that the bike was in use during World War II, and here's the really cool part. The most obvious sign that the bike was in use during the war is the "Dunlop War Grade" tyres that were still on it when I bought it. Although these could have been remainders put on after the war, it's pretty amazing to think that the last time these tyres were changed could have been in the 1940s.

Another pretty clear indication that it was used during the war is the white "blackout stripe" rather sloppily painted on the rear fender (mudguard, for the Brits), apparently in house paint. I can imagine the original owner cringing a bit as he slopped white paint on his glossy black fender and gold pinstripes.

The final clue, and the one that is perhaps the most moving for me, is that replacement brake pads appear to have been cut from salvaged rubber and installed in the shoes, I'm guessing in order to conserve resources during the war. 

The sad part, and the real conundrum for folks like me, is that all of these features have now either been removed or covered up in the process of making the bike useable again. The material evidence of the bicycle's eventful past has literally been stripped away, out of necessity of course, but it's still a little sad. My great comfort, though, is that the bicycle will again be used for its intended purpose, rather than rusting in a back yard. I will also keep the tyres and brakes, of course, to pass on to the next owner of the Runwell, but hopefully that won't be for a long, long time.

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The Runwell Test Ride!

Ladies and gentleman, the Runwell runs well! In fact, the Runwell runs like a dream! After realizing that the new tires I bought on Saturday don't fit on the Westwood rims (they popped right off under minimal air pressure), and then changing out the tires from the Columbia, which worked perfectly, I put on the chain, made some adjustments, tightened down all the nuts, and I was off. I wanted to take a test ride before placing my Harris order, since I wasn't sure if I would need a new seatpost until I tried the existing one, and it turns out that it works just fine, and doesn't seat me too far forward, as I had thought it would.

This is probably the most solid bicycle I've ever ridden, at least in my adult life. With just one speed, it runs silently, and the coaster brake functions just beautifully. It seats you bolt upright, as I knew it would, but the still-comfy old Brooks saddle feels like sitting in a chair. It's responsive, relatively light, and although not terribly fast, it can move if it has a mind to. As my wife and I took turns circling an empty parking lot near our house, it already received its first compliment from a woman who stopped to admire it. Not bad for the first five minutes of its new life!

Still to do: paint and topcoat the rear fender, which will take a little while because I have both white and black paint to apply, order and install the new front brakes and pedals, put a second coat of varnish on the grips, and do all the final cleaning, polishing, and waxing. With all of it, I think I'm looking at another two weeks, taking delivery time from Harris (on the other side of the country from me) into consideration. I might post a few more teaser photos in the meantime, but you'll have to wait a bit for the grand unveiling.  

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The Runwell: Days 11 & 12

After one day spent badly bungling trying to re-lace my rear wheel, an evening carefully studying Sheldon Brown's guide, and another afternoon finally getting the stupid thing right, I can now say that I've built a wheel, or rather rebuilt a wheel. Once I actually pulled my head out of my...well...and thought about it for a minute, it all went pretty well, with the exception that I stripped a nipple (cue childish snickering) that's going to have to be replaced and the wheel trued.

I also greased and reassembled the rear hub, and now have a functional rear wheel that's in much better shape than when I found it. Here's the before picture for a comparison.

 

I've even tested the coaster brake by spinning the wheel in my hands, and it seems to work just fine. Like I said before, it's not quite as shiny as I would have liked, but there's only so much one can do after years of weather. 

On a side note, after exchanging emails with a very nice gent and former mechanic in England (who remembered when Runwell was still around in the 1960s as a smallish parts distributor), I believe I'm dealing with what's left of the original nickel plating, rather than chrome, which does a little more to explain why it was so badly deteriorated. Chrome was apparently introduced in 1928, but nickel plating was still applied after that date, so it remains hard to pin down exactly when my bike was manufactured.

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The Runwell: Days 9 & 10

Despite my recent disappointment at the utter failure of Menotomy's "Vintage Bicycle Cleaning Kit" (grrrr), I've been plowing ahead with the rear wheel cleanup. Unfortunately, although it is certainly better than it was, I have had to settle for an "antique patina" finish rather than shiny chrome and steel. The chrome is simply wasted after years of rusting outside. As a testament to the heartiness of the old construction, everything is still structurally sound, just cosmetically ruined. I'm still pressing on with my plan to get the bike back up and running before thinking about repainting and re-chroming (after all, I've not even ridden the thing yet), but someday down the road, I'll do both. Until then, no riding in the rain (not hard in SoCal). Here's the after picture of the outside of the rear hub, with the Perry mark relatively clear. The shiny strip is the result of being covered by the dust clip for so many years. Below is the before picture, so you can see that I did accomplish something. Right now, I still have the wheel completely taken apart, and everything is clean (if not shiny). I've never taken apart or reassembled a wheel before, so I'm advancing with trepidation, but I have faith that I'll be able to figure it out. I only attempted it here because the single-speed wheel on the Westwood rim is built without a dish because there is no derailer and gear cluster to compensate for, making it a much more straightforward build. For those who are interested, the rear rim is a 40-spoke design, typical of old English bikes, but not otherwise very common.  I'm going to hold off posting a "how to" about reassembling the wheel until I see if I actually "can do," but check out Sheldon Brown on wheel building in the meantime. Once the wheel is back together, both wheels and the frame are off to the bike shop for truing and to have the cottered cranks and stubborn stuck pedal removed. Once that's done, I'll just need to assemble all the replacement parts, and put 'er back together. I'm sure it won't be that easy, however.

 

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The Runwell: Day 8

While I wait for some super-spiffy cleaning solution to arrive by mail so I can properly clean the rear wheel, chainring, and crank arms, I decided to re-dismantle the rear hub and really clean the whole thing up. Here's all the little bits (more or less) looking much cleaner than they did previously.  To be perfectly honest, making all these dirty little parts all nice and clean again gives me a great amount of pleasure. It's probably 2/3 of the reason I like working on old bikes. As for the condition of everything in there, frankly, there's some wear, as one might expect from a seventy-odd-year-old hub, but only time (read: reassembly) will tell if everything still functions properly. I believe it should, but what do I know?

      

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Perry Coaster Brake Hub

In response to my query a few days ago, a kind reader (rb, of A Balanced View) has helped me identify my rear hub as a Perry & Co. coaster hub (i.e. back-pedaling brake).  Apparently, the big arm (the brake actuator) coming off the left side of the hub and clamped to the frame should have been my first clue (you learn something new every day).  Here's a diagram of the hub, with all the bits identified.  I'm thrilled that I have a coaster brake--I haven't had one since I was a wee lad.

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The Runwell: Day 6

Today's tasks (because I just couldn't fathom another day of rust-scrubbing) involved cleaning and repacking the front hub, which went quite well, and dismantling the rear hub just to see what was in there and how bad it was. I knew it would be pretty gummy and dirty because the rear wheel barely turns. I had no idea. The photo on top shows the relative positions of the major pieces before I wiped the worst of the gunk off (yes, I know it needs gunk to work, but this stuff was--and still is--pretty badly gummed-up). The middle photo shows a more exploded view of the components, and the third photo shows them with the worst of the old grease wiped off.  

Also, having never taken apart a single-speed hub before, I was surprised at the complexity of the mechanisms. I mean, it's nothing compared to a three-speed hub, which frankly scares the ever-loving crap out of me, but I wouldn't have thought that just a single-speed would have so many moving parts. I can't find any exploded diagrams of single-speed hubs, and the outside of this one is still too rusty to find a manufacturer's stamp. Does anyone know if there's a general guide or diagram to one-speed hubs out there on the interwebs? I'd like to know what all the little bits are called.

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