23.10.2015

JCB celebrates 70 years

JCB was founded on October 23rd, 1945 by the late Joseph Cyril Bamford in a garage in the Staffordshire market town of Uttoxeter

It was the same day as his son Anthony, the current chairman, was born, leading Bamford senior to say: “being presented with a son tends to concentrate the mind and when you were starting at the bottom, there was only one way to go and that was up.”
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JCB was founded in a small garage in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire on October 23rd, 1945 by Joseph Cyril Bamford

The first product was a tipper trailer made out of war time scrap and sold for £45 at the town’s market. The buyer’s old cart was also taken in part exchange and was refurbished it and sold for another £45 – achieving the original asking price of the trailer. The company expanded at a steady pace moving to larger premises each time and beginning to employ staff.
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JCB's first products were farm trailers such as this

In 1953 Bamford designed the backhoe loader with a hydraulic rear excavator and front mounted shovel, which put the small company firmly on the map. To date the company has manufactured more than 600,000 on three continents. This was also the year that the JCB logo was first used on a machine.
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The first construction products simply mounted a backhoe and a loader onto Fordson farm tractors

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A restored JCB 3C the first unit that resembles a modern JCB loader/backhoe

In 1977 the company built its first telescopic handler which has gone on to be one of the most successful products in JCB’s history.
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The first JCB telehandlers arrived in 1977

On March 1st 2001 Joseph Cyril Bamford passed away, having seen his company grow way beyond his original expectations, with long established substantial production facilities in the USA and India and a name that had become a generic word for loader backhoes.

To celebrate the anniversary the company is producing a limited run of 70 ‘platinum’ versions of its famous loader backhoe. They will come complete with red buckets, full white cab and red wheels instead of the customary black and yellow finish – a livery last seen on the 3CIII model in 1979. And will be equipped with in-cab coffee makers. The company is also giving all its 12,000 employees around the world and extra days holiday to celebrate the milestone.
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JCB graduates, apprentices and retired employees with one of 70 limited edition backhoe loaders being built to mark the company’s 70th anniversary

Anthony Bamford who is also celebrating his 70th birthday today said: “The backhoe loader was the building block for the success of JCB and while we now produce many other different types of machines for construction, agricultural and industrial machines, it remains one of our most important products. The JCB backhoe has not only helped put JCB on the map but Staffordshire and Britain too and I’m delighted that we are producing limited edition models to mark the company’s anniversary.”