Rudge and Whitworth: Britain's Best Bicycle

1902
Silent

A gentleman cyclist learns the error of his ways in one of the earliest surviving British film advertisements.

Motion picture advertising was barely five years old when this Edwardian promo was made. Our gentleman cyclist looks rather worse for wear. If only he had a new Rudge-Whitworth bicycle he'd be a happier man! With its short, 30-second duration and simple, humorous message, this entertaining commercial shows that the wheel of screen advertising has turned full circle.

Rudge-Whitworth, formed in 1894 from the merger of the Rudge Cycle Co. and the Whitworth Cycle Co., was one of Britain's leading manufacturers of bicycles and motorcycles. The company reached its peak in the early 1930s, but suffered in the Depression. The bicycle business was ultimately sold to Raleigh, which kept the name alive for many years.

Commercial Break: British Advertising on Screen

Few films capture our hopes, fears and desires in such a compact expressive form as the screen advertisement.

A part of the film story from its earliest days, advertising grew up with the cinema, going on to transform television and colonising the online world with seductive viral videos. Look out for famous faces both before and after they had their big break, and the illustrious names of those behind the camera who, like Ridley Scott and Alan Parker, took their talents into mainstream cinema.

Here are snapshots of what we ate, how we travelled, and the lives we aspired to. But remember: other lifestyles are available.