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Rolff Lunsmann has developed a mini website entirely devoted
to the Malvern Star. It has the most comprehensive information currently
available all in the one place. It is not available in any other format.
go to
Malvern Star website
in addition, you might
like to read this......
From an article in the “Vintage Cycle Club of Victoria
newsletter No 8 “ by Kim Fawkes and in “The Australian Cycle Trader” March
1958 by Hubert Oppermam.
The name “Malvern Star’ has been with us
since the early 1900’s. No 58 Glenferrie Rd, Malvern, Victoria, was the first
home of the Malvern Star Cycle Works.
In 1920, Bruce Small visited the then Malvern Star works at 185 Glenfarrie Rd
Malvern, which at the time was managed by Tom Finnegan. He had won the famed
Austral Wheel race in 1898, and had been managing the shop for some years. He
had been trading under “Malvern Star Cycling Co” or ‘MCC.”. Due to
failing health and desire to live in the country, Tom sold his shop to Bruce
Small for 1125 pounds on a deposit of 200 pounds.
From that small suburban bicycle shop with its first 12 months turnover of 6,818
pounds, it flourished like the fabled beanstalk to its peak 1957/58 of 2½
million pounds. Bruce Small was to make his business successful by offering his
bicycles for sale on a deposit of 10 shillings. Bruce and his two brothers,
Frank and Ralph, then set about developing the shop. The period in which they
were living was a sufficiently difficult one to establish a new business, but
survive they did. Petrol for motor vehicle was still scarce and, as ever,
bicycles were still popular. After a complaint about the prices of 2 pounds down
and 5 shillings weekly, Bruce replied “That’s your business, gentlemen, this
is mine!”
Over the next few years, the business prospered so much that more shops were
opened. The first new shop was opened at Gardenvale in 1923. At the end of that
year, a sales record of 13,869 pounds had been achieved. Other shops to develop
as the years passed were Prahan, Elizabeth Street, New South Wales, Queensland,
and Western Australia.
As his business prospered, Bruce Small ‘floated’ several companies. In 1929,
General Accessories Pty Ltd was floated for 5,500 pounds. Three years later, it
was the turn for Bicycle Finance Pty Ltd. Sales records were still being
achieved, with a marginal increase during the years of the Depression in the
1930s.
One very important aspect of his business was the BSA (Birmingham Small Arms)
franchise which Bruce Small obtained in 1935, after ruthless dealings with other
competitors. This was essential to his company, as BSA was the manufacturer of
quality bicycle accessories and components. The BSA franchise gave him a ready
overseas and interstate market.
1937 saw the establishment of two other headquarters in South Australia and
Tasmania. By the end of the following year, there were 24 branches and 450
agencies scattered across Australia.
Bruce Small was known as a harsh but able businessman, but one side of him,
which came to the surface only later, was his position as a sports’ promoter.
The racing industry was his forte and he encouraged it exclusively. It was his
partnership and friendship with Hubert Opperman which secured a bond.
‘Oppy’, as he was now to friends and acquaintances alike, had begun his
racing career at the age of sixteen, in the same year that Bruce Small began
building his bicycle empire. The first race that Oppy won was the Senior Cadet
Road Championship in 1921, a ten-mile race. The following year, he rode the
fastest time in the Launceston to Hobart race. His connection with Bruce Small
and Malvern Star came in the 1923 Malvern Star 25-mile Event in which he
achieved the fastest time. The following year, he again achieved the fastest
time in the Malvern Star 50-mile Event. He competed, with Malvern Star’s
sponsorship, in an additional forty events by 1930. In 1936, he achieved a great
feat in the Brisbane-to-Sydney event, a distance of 651 miles. He began on 15
October and completed the distance in 47 hours 10 minutes. In doing so, he
lowered the road record by 45 hours 9 minutes. The previous record had been held
by Les Cecil of Queensland, who ten years earlier had established the record of
3 days 20 hours 19 minutes. His previous year’s antics had occurred in
England. On 16 July, 1935, he broke the London-Bath-London record in 10 hours 14
minutes 42 seconds. That same month, on a similar ride over the same distance,
he tandemed with another famous cyclist, Ern Miliken, and broke the previous
tandem record held by C.Marshall and L.Cave of 9 hours 45 minutes 13 seconds.
Miliken and Oppy’s time was 8 hours 53 minutes 34 seconds.
Meanwhile, Bruce Small was combining his interest in racing with bringing
overseas stars to Australia. In his promotion of the junior championships, he
imported two young French riders to Australia for the 1936 Junior Championship.
They were Guy Berchou and Pierre Soulliac. He also imported two other French
riders later – Jean Bidot and Jacques Mauclain.
As war clouds darkened the horizon, Bruce Small Pty Ltd was faced with a
quandary. Exports from the usual supplies overseas disappeared and the company
successfully adapted its machines to churn out thousands of bicycles for the war
effort. After it was seen how the Japanese soldiers on bicycles had captured the
port and city of Singapore, the Australian Army ordered thousands. This
prosperity in business continued well after the war years, as the public
depended on public transport and mobility. Petrol was still rationed. The
Heath-Robinson gas producer was still a familiar sight on many cars and trucks,
and it was not until 1947 that this clumsy looking apparatus disappeared.
There was a set back in October 1946, when damage estimated at 30,000 pounds was
caused by a fire in a four-storey cycle factory in Sydney. Lacquers and other
inflammable materials fed the flames and, in addition to the enameling shop,
tyres, records and partly assembled bicycles were lost in the fire.
However, Malvern Star continued to expand. Its bikes were a household word for
years.
Bruce Small retired on Feb 28, 1958. To mark his retirement from active
participation in the Cycle Trade, the Wholesalers and Retailers Associatons of
Victoria entertained him at a dinner and each association made a presentation to
record its appreciation of his contribution to the trade. Sid Holland was the
Master of Ceremonies
Both Malvern Star and General Accessories were sold to
Electronic Enterprises in 1958. They owned the business
until at least 1965. After that I don't know who owned it
when but I understand that Phillips owned it at one time.
At the Los Angels Olympics in 1984, Australia’s gold medal winning 4000 metres
pursuit team rode Malvern Stars. The champions were Dean Woods, Michael Turter,
Kevin Nichols and Michael Grenda.
In Sept 1987, General Accessories, the manufacturers of Malvern Star, announced
the cessation of manufacture of the bikes in Australia. After a business
spanning almost eighty years, a dangerous precedent has been established. The
Industries Assistance Commission advised the Federal Government to lower our
import tariff by half. This effectively increased the number of cheaper bikes
from overseas and lowered the Australian market. While Malvern Star was
producing quality bikes from quality Australian parts at a higher cost, overseas
companies (Taiwan and Japan) were producing them at a lower cost. Mr Geoff
Hayden, the General Manager for General Accessories said that Malvern Star will
retain its quality while being manufactured overseas.
In 1992, the name Malvern Star, re-entered the racing scene with one of the most
expensive limited production bikes available. The bike, proudly displaying the
Hubert Opperman signature along the top tube, is a bike that could re-establish
the Company name at the top level of cycle sport. The frame is designed and
manufactured in Tasmania by Frank McCallum, frame builder for Kevin McBain, in
conjunction with McBain’s. It is made of Reynolds 708 Classic tubing, the
frame having an overall racy look and feel to it. The price ticket is $4,300.
Malvern Star is now owed by Pacific Dunlop. Pacific Dunlop
finally acquired that name after a lot of industry
rationalisation brought on by the downturn in the bicycle industry.
The bikes and parts are imported from China. The Australian office is in
Brooklyn, Victoria. In the reception area of this office there are 2 bikes on
display. One is a motorised bike and the other is Pennyfarthing, although I
don’t know if Malvern Star ever made Pennyfarthings.
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Serial Numbers
Malvern Star serial numbers were generally of the form 9M99999. Some
say that the first number corresponds with the last digit of the year of
manufacture and the M is for Melbourne as there are some of the form 9S9999
where S means manufactured in Sydney. However, there are great inconsistency in
these numbers and none of these rules regularly hold true. The best way to judge
the decade of manufacture is to look carefully at the components if they are
original. The brand and model on components will often date the bike as they
changed often.
The following are some of the bikes that we know about. If you have found a
serial number on your Malvern Star bike, please send it to us, so that we can
add it to this list and perhaps work out a system.
s/t is on the seat tube and rrd is on the right rear drop out.
Type Description
Date On
Serial No
Delivery
1920’s s/t
12975
Delivery
1938 s/t
IM5676
Delivery
1930’s ? s/t
6M28874
Delivery
1930’s ? s/t
7M4542
Ladies 28”
1942 s/t
4M23112
Ladies 2 star
1915? s/t
5M21701
Ladies 2 star
s/t 8224
Ladies 1 star
1950’s rrd
81259
Ladies
1960
rrd 02234
Ladies coronation 1953
Ladies coronation
1953
7P446
Ladies coronation
1954 s/t
56M/9265
Girls 16”
1953
s/t 53M/10503
Girls 2 star
1970 s/t
5M26030
Gents 2 star
1940
rrd 30496
Gents
1941
rrd 41/50255
Gents 5 star
1944
lrd 9M9/798
Gents 4 star
rrd
05345
Gents 3 star
1960’s
rrd
OM18076
Gents 2 star
rrd
93368
Boys 2 star
1940’s s/t
6840
Boys
1950
Gents cantilever
1960’s b/b
41195
Family
1970’s b/w 1279943
Tandem
1975 s/t
7644
Folding smallwheel 1985
rrb
S3F90121
Postscript: Many of the Malvern Star records were destroyed in another
fire, on the premises of the Melbourne Cycling Club.
* There are lots of photos of Opperman in the State Library of
NSW, under the heading of Opperman collection and also Bruce Small
* Warren Meade of Bairnsdale would be pleased to hear from
anyone with serial numbers to help with accurate dating. vintagebikes@a1.com.au
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