A car badge for National Trust members

Jeffrey Bridges, a long-standing member, tells how his father acquired the first ever National Trust car badge.

The Morris with its National Trust badge

My late father learnt to drive aged 20 in 1936 in his father’s newly acquired car, and as his father did not drive he drove them for day trips and holidays over much of England and Wales. I have pre-war travelogues written by my Dad recording the places they visited and the things they saw, a fascinating insight into a lost world of motoring.

My grandfather died in 1941 and my father inherited the car, a 1935 Morris 12/4 which was laid up for most of the war years. When peace returned Dad and Grandma resumed their motoring. The first mention of being a National Trust member is 1946, though it is quite possible that they joined before the war. The AA badge I have dates to 1939.

On 21st January 1946 my Dad wrote to the National Trust to suggest that with the advent of Post-War motoring they may like to consider issuing a car badge for members and suggested a green enamelled design. The Trust replied that they would have the suggestion examined by a ‘publicity expert’. On 26th September the Trust wrote again, firstly to acknowledge receipt of my father’s membership subscription and secondly to say that they were in ‘entire agreement’ with the car badge suggestion and would be taking it up, saying further that they were now waiting for quotes to manufacture the badges.

There is now a break in the correspondence until 10th July 1947 when the Trust sent a official receipt to my Dad following his call at the Queen Anne’s Gate offices in London the previous day, presumably to collect his new member’s badge. A receipt for 12/6d was included and the letter says “If it is of any interest to you, you might like to know that you are the first member to possess one of these (badges)”. When I recently contacted the Trust with this story, their archivists sent me a digital copy of the first post-war newsletter, dated July 1947 in which they advertise the availability of car badges – in limited numbers. The new badge was duly affixed to the old Morris, along with various other badges and quite a few accessory lamps.

My parents married in 1953 and the Morris took them on honeymoon in North Wales. They lived with my Grandma and the car continued to take them all on holidays and days out. My father loved England and I have inherited his many books on English topography etc.

I came along in 1957 and early memories include trips in the old car, which came to the end of the road in September 1960, by which time I had been joined by a baby brother.

Jeffrey, his father and the Wolseley 1961

To replace the old Morris my parents bought a two year old 1958 Wolseley Six-Ninety to which a new ‘Desmo’ badge bar was duly affixed together with some of the badges. Growing up I recall regular visits to local NT properties, Osterley House, Ashridge Beacon and others, as well as properties in Sussex, which was our favourite holiday county.

My father had a tendency to keep things, change was infrequent – a trend I have inherited – and the Wolseley continued to serve as the family car well into the 1970s. Other cars came along, but the Wolseley somehow remained, complete with its badges, and I took it over back in 1984.

I was told the story of the NT badge, but paid little attention to it, although my wife and I joined the Trust soon after we married in 1980 and my parents remained members through to their respective deaths. After Mum died I came across the correspondence about the badge and took a renewed interest.

I restored the Wolseley in 2016-18 and at the time had the NT badge re-chromed, and that Wolseley is still used regularly to visit NT properties.

The Wolseley bearing the first ever National Trust car badge on a visit to Batemans in 2018