Abstract
In November 1918 when war came to an end, Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds (GKN) stood as one of Britain’s largest manufacturing companies. Comprising three steelworks, a substantial collection of fastener factories in the Midlands and a group of collieries in South Wales, it had followed paths of both vertical and horizontal integration. According to a ranking prepared for 1919 based upon the estimated market value of capital, GKN came sixteenth (£8.2 million), and within the metal industry only Vickers (fourth, £19.5 million), United Steel (tenth, £13.2 million) and Armstrong, Whitworth (eleventh, £12.2 million) were higher.1 It remained in essence a trading company (Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds), with a small number of manufacturing subsidiaries (such as the British Screw Co.), and its operational base was limited to England and Wales. The only overseas venture in which GKN had an interest was a one-third holding in the Orconera Iron Ore Co. of Bilbao, which leased a major group of hematite mines at Obregon, Santander.2
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References
Leslie Hannah, The Rise of the Corporate Economy, London (1983), p. 189.
G.G. Jones (Editor), British Multinationals: Origins, Management and Performance, Aldershot (1986), Edgar Jones ‘Steel and Engineering Overseas: Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds’ Multinational Growth 1918–1965’, pp. 165–6.
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, March 1916–September 1922, 4 July 1918, it. 3102; 22 August 1918, it. 3142.
The Engineer, Vol. CLV, 21 April 1933, Obituary, p. 391; Jones, GKN, Vol. One, op. cit., p. 188.
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 7, September 1926–April 1928, 9 September 1926, it. 4989.
For further details of Edward Steer, see Jones, GKN, Vol. One, op. cit., pp. 222–24.
Ibid., p. 391.
GKN, Annual Report and Accounts (1916) and (1917).
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, 1917–18, passim.
Ibid., 22 August 1918, it. 3142; DBB, Vol. 3 (1985), Edgar Jones, ‘J.H. Jolly’, pp. 523–26.
Stenton and Lees, WWMP, Vol. 3, 1919–45, Brighton (1979).
GKN, Annual Report and Accounts (1918).
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3.
Ibid., 3 October 1918, it. 3161.
Colliery Guardian, Vol. CLXVI, No. 4287, 26 February 1943, Obituary, p. 260.
DBB, Vol. 3 (1985), Colin Baber and Trevor Boyns, ‘John Lysaght’, pp. 895–99.
Ibid., Edgar Jones, ‘W.R. Lysaght’, p. 902.
The Lysaght Century, 1857–1957, Bristol (1957), p. 61.
Interview E. Jones with E.C. Lysaght, December 1983.
Colliery Guardian, Vol. CXXXII, No. 3430, 24 September 1926, Obituary, p. 680.
The Lysaght Century, op. cit., p. 29; J.C. Carr and W. Taplin, History of the British Steel Industry, Oxford (1962), p. 386.
This would have been Vol. 3 in the series and is the only gap.
DBB, Vol. 1 (1984), Christine Shaw, ‘William Ewert Berry and James Gomer Berry’, pp. 301–9.
J. Lysaght Minute Book, Vol. 4, August 1921–March 1926, 19 August 1921, p.1.
DBB, Vol. 5 (1986), Edgar Jones, ‘Joseph Sankey’, p. 63.
Ibid., Edgar Jones, ‘John William Sankey’, pp. 60–2.
Joseph Sankey & Sons, Minute Book, Vol. 3, 1917–1921, 4 July 1919, p. 113.
Ibid., 30 January 1919, p. 92.
Ibid., 19 November 1919, p. 130.
Ibid.
See Jones, GKN, Vol. One, op. cit., pp. 87–90, 120–25.
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, op. cit., 20 February 1920, it. 3457.
Ibid., 20 February 1920, it. 3458.
J. Lysaght Minute Book, Vol. 4, op. cit., 19 August 1921, p. 1.
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, op. cit., it. 3459; GKN Annual Report and Accounts, No. 20, (1920).
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, op. cit., 4 December 1920, it. 3623.
Ibid., 15 December 1920, it. 3626.
GKN Report and Accounts (1918–1919).
Interview J. Cockcroft with J.H. Jolly, 25 July 1972, p. 2.
GKN Minute Book, Vol. 3, op. cit., 28 August 1919, it. 3367.
DBB, Vol. 3 (1985), Edgar Jones, ‘Sir Kenneth Swift Peacock’, p. 570.
GKN Annual Report and Accounts, No. 20, (1920).
An Outline History of GKN, Birmingham [c. 1926], pp. 57–8.
B.W.E. Alford, Depression and Recovery? British Economic Growth, 1918–1938, London (1979), p. 15.
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© 1990 GKN plc
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Jones, E. (1990). GKN and the Post-War Boom, Merger and Acquisitions, 1919–23. In: A History of GKN. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09664-0_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09664-0_1
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