COVENTRY MOTETTE
Although only in production for a handful of years, the Coventry Motette is remembered as one of the first motorised vehicles produced in the town and an example is on display at the Coventry Transport Museum (which purchased it for £475 in 1961). It was a modified version of the Leon Bollee tricar in which the passenger seat was placed between the front wheels and the driver sat at the back. Also, in an early example of equal opportunities, the company produced a model aimed specifically at the fairer sex, although this example of potential equality was rather undermined by
Coventry Motette advertising its product at the Lady Godiva Fair of 1897 by mounting a tricar and a lady driver on a wagon with, written on the side of the vehicle,
‘Any Fool Can Drive The Coventry Motette.’ It was also unusual in that sales were accompanied by a small book on how to drive the Coventry Motette (indicating that perhaps it wasn’t quite as easy as that fair display had made out).
There seems to have been no further production after 1903 but, by then, the Coventry Motette had made another small mark on history by being the very first motor car in Northampton. It was owned by Joseph G Grose who invented the Grose patent gear case in 1897. Made of leather, this covered the cycle’s driving mechanism to protect ladies’ skirts from catching in the chain (and was later used to cover the drive chain of cars).
It made Grose a rich man and it appears one of his very first purchases was a Coventry Motette!