This year is the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of the Austin Seven and this post continues with the theme of cars in the Cotswold Motoring Museum collection that have links to the Austin Seven: it brings us to the Mini or in this case, the 1972 Mini Clubman shown below.

As we saw in an earlier post, the Austin Seven was born as a consequence of a financial crisis in the 1920s.

Following the 1956 Suez fuel crisis, in which fuel rationing almost became a reality, Alec Issigonis’s concept for a small, economical car resulted in the first Morris and Austin Mini.

It was marketed under the names Austin Seven and Morris Mini-Minor. Yes, such was the power of the Austin Seven name that the company re-used it for those early versions of the Mini in 1959. The choice of name was made, in part, because it was felt that the Mini embodied many of the characteristics of the original Austin Seven. It was designed as an affordable car that would appeal to a wide cross-section of new buyers.

It wasn’t until 1962 that the Mini brand was adopted. Those original Minis were badged as Austin Se7ens or Morris Mini-Minors, depending on where they were built. The only difference between them was that the Se7en had a wavy grille whereas the Morris had a straight grille. The connection between the Austin Sevens and the Mini Clubman in the museum collection is admittedly one of the most tenuous that we have made in these posts. Our final car from the collection will be the Austin Seven Ulster where the linkage is much more than a naming convention. It returns to an example of a derivative from that 100-year-old model that has proved so enduring.

Look out for the final post very shortly.