Approx. 1882
From left to right: Absalom Bassett, Tryphena Bassett, Wenman Joseph
with his mother Eliza Lowke, Joseph Tom Lowke and Harry White Bassett

In 1899 Wenman Bassett - lowke started with a friend the company Bassett - lowke & Co in Northampton, England.

In 1901 they started producing trains and they cooperated with Carette and Bing from Nuremberg. Between 1901 and 1914 sellings increased. The first catalog was published in 1901 and the last one in 1969. The 1901 catalog also show products from Carette, Bing and Plank.

The companie's vision was producing high quality, finescale models. Bing manufactured the more expensive models as Carette was a supplier for the cheaper ones.

After WW1 the relation with Bing was renewed and after Northampton there were productionplants in Edinburg (1922) and in Manchester (1929).

In 1953 Wenman Bassett - Lowke died and in the same time the production of industrial models dominated. In 1965 the Bassett company was sold to Beatties and in 1968 a restart was undertaken, however without succes.

In 1969 a commemorative edition was published. In this book many pages of catalogs between 1902 and 1963 have been reprinted together with general info about Bassett - Lowkes relationship and other modeltrain manufactureres.

Corgi purchased the Bassett - Lowke brand name in 1996 and re-launched the railway locomotive products from 1999 at which time the original company would have been 100 years old.

On the 1st of may 2008 Hornby acquired Corgi and as part of the acquisition, Hornby also acquired Bassett-Lowke.

Bassett - Lowke produces nowadays a range of 0 gauge locomotives that are individually made from sheet metal using soldered construction and reflect those made in a bygone era.

1932, 272 Seitenpages, pagecount
starts at 145
(€120,-)