Karrier

Karrier was a British marque of motorised municipal appliances and light commercial vehicles and trolley buses manufactured at Karrier Works, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, by Clayton and Co., Huddersfield, Limited. They began making Karrier motor vehicles in 1908 in Queen Street South, Huddersfield. In 1920, H.F. Clayton sold Clayton and Co's Huddersfield business into public listed company Karrier Motors while keeping their Penistone operation separate. Mechanical and electrical engineers Clayton & Co Penistone, remain active in 2020 as Clayton Penistone Group. Karrier produced buses as well as their other municipal vehicles and in latter years, especially during the Second World War, Trolleybuses, notably their Karrier 'W' model. In 1934 Karrier became part of the Rootes Group where it retained its brand identity though the business was operated as part of Rootes's Commer commercial vehicle operation. The Karrier name began to disappear from products when Chrysler bought Rootes in 1967. It was finally dropped in the early 1970s. Herbert Fitzroy Clayton (1857–1935), a prosperous chemicals manufacturer or drysalter and dyer, incorporated in December 1904 a company, Clayton & Co Huddersfield Limited, to own the engineering business he had carried on independently since 1899 when he had left his Dixon Clayton & Co partnership. In 1908, joined by his second son, Reginald Fitzroy Clayton MIAE (1885–1964), Clayton & Co began designing and making Karrier petrol driven motor vehicles and charabancs which became their main business. In 1920, keeping Clayton & Co Penistone separate and retaining control of this new company, Clayton & Co Huddersfield was sold to a newly incorporated public listed company which they named Karrier Motors Limited.