Saturday 24th November 1951
Austin and Morris agreed to merge, making the combined business, named BMC (British Motor Corporation), the biggest in the British motor trade and the fourth-largest internationally after the US ‘Big Three’ of General Motors, Chrysler and Ford. In a joint statement the two companies announced that they would retain their separate identities and would not produce the same models. Forty years later the merger was recognised to have been a political decision in the face of American competition and the absence of heirs for either Morris or Austin.