|
Admin
history |
The Scottish Motor Traction Company (SMT) was founded in June 1905 by William J Thomson to operate bus services in and around Edinburgh.
A subsidiary company, Scottish Motor Traction Sales and Service Company Ltd was established in 1910 to concentrate on the sale of motor vehicles.
In 1925, the subsidiary company bought over Peebles Motor Company and converted it into their Roseburn Street depot. By 1933, the company headquarters were established in Fountainbridge.
SMT Sales and Service continued to expand during the 1930s buying companies and premises in Dundee, Carlisle, Glasgow and Edinburgh, including Glasgow firms Western Motor Company and Charles Grant and Co, 1935 and Croall and Croall, Edinburgh, 1937.
During the post-war years, the company increased its number of garages and showrooms, specialising in the sale of Vauxhall-Bedford, Leyland and General Motors vehicles. They bought over Ritchies of Glasgow, South Western Coach Works Ltd, Elgin Motors Ltd and Autos and Hires Ltd and built their largest depot at Finnieston. By the 1960s, the company ran 22 depots between Inverness and Carlisle.
Before his death in 1949, Sir William J Thomson sold SMT Co Ltd to the government in line with the compulsory nationalisation of large bus fleets but bought back SMT Sales and Service, which continued as a separate company until May 1991, having passed into the hands of Charles Clore of Sears Holding in 1956. |