Main entrance to Skurrays, Old Town, 1965Britain's oldest retailer: WHEN the motoring bug first bit Ernest Clement Skurray a century ago, nobody could have predicted that the automotive industry would grow up to be the giant it is now.

In fact, his friends might well have told him he was mad to turn his attention from milling and selling flour to selling and repairing the new horseless carriages.

However, EC was blessed with rare foresight and was prepared to take a business gamble.

The garage business which he opened next to the family mill in Princes Street in 1899 flourished spectacularly.

Skurray's is now Britain's oldest motor retailer.

In 1907 it had outgrown its premises and moved to a larger site behind a double-fronted house in High Street, Old Town, where EC opened a showroom and repair shop.

By the time young men were joining up to fight in the trenches during the 1914-18 war, the letter head of Skurray's Motor Engineers was proclaiming the firm as sole agent for Wolseley, Ford and Arrol Johnston cars and holder of "full motor equipment and large tyre stock of leading manufacturers".

Its telephone number was Swindon 5 and that wasn't the only thing which was a fraction of today's typical figures.

A bill for repairing a speedometer cable, supplying one speedometer pinion plus five gallons of oil and a cylinder head spanner to Messrs Hillier and Son of Marlborough added up to just 17s 6p (87.5p).

An account dated February 5, 1919 for a Model T chassis fitted with a five-seater English touring body, painted buff with black trimmings and supplied to agricultural engineer W L Bartrop of Highworth cost £342.

It included: "Converting the wheels to detachable, complete with spare wheel and tyre, carrier for spare wheel, hood case and delivery charges from Manchester."

But EC, whose first order in 1899 had been for six eight horsepower Accles Turrell cars and who by 1919 also had a showroom in Reading, soon turned his back on Ford and moved on to bigger and more specialist automobiles.

By 1926 Skurray's had replaced the old High Street premises with a much larger showroom in mock Tudor style.

There the eyes of Swindon's car connoisseurs and wanna-haves of the flapper era feasted on hefty Hupmobiles, 4.5 litre Bentleys and stately Vauxhalls with wide running boards and leather upholstery the ultimate in reliability and class.

Director C J B Masters, who joined the firm as a grease-covered apprentice in 1922 and rose to be managing director after Ernest Skurray retired, described them all as "great cars".

"But you had to be fit to drive them," said Mr Masters, who was known as Basil to staff and customers alike.

"Apart from their weight, driver comfort in those days usually meant a top coat, muffler and cap and you needed them, I assure you."

Today Skurray's employs about 100 people at its Vauxhall and Daewoo sales and servicing centres in Drove Road, Hillmead and Marlborough.

Its workshops and body repair centre in Drove Road draws Vauxhall owners from all over North Wiltshire and beyond.

Michael Alford, retail sales manager at Skurray's Hillmead centre in Langley Road, said recent months had seen dramatic changes for the company.

"We have been owned by W Grose of Northampton for some time but in the last year their influence on Skurray's has been a lot stronger," he said.

Several of the managers have changed and none of them have strong ties to the old Skurray's family firm.

"It's a change in the way we do things and we're now very much customer-focused," said Mr Alford.

"There is now a lot more competition from other dealers."

But despite the challenges ahead Mr Alford was confident the name of Skurray's would play an important role in Swindon's motoring industry for years to come.