O’Gorman Bros: inside the Irish Coachbuilding Works

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In April 1922 and April 1934, studio photographer A.H. Poole of Waterford travelled 30 miles west to Clonmel to photograph the premises of Prior Park Garage, where O’Gorman Bros Ltd carried out its work. The results can be seen here in a number of copies of Poole’s high-quality glass negatives.

John O'Gorman had trained in London and worked for another Irish coachbuilder before starting his own business with his brother James in the late 1910s. They became dealers for Austin, Ford and Humber, and, following a visit to Germany shortly after the World War I, established Ireland’s first Mercedes-Benz dealership. O’Gorman Bros built almost anything on wheels, from horse-drawn carriages to buses, vans and cars, and also manufactured ‘gigs, landaus, jaunting carts, floats and dray carts’. There were even at least two limousines for a senior official and lorries for the Irish army.

In the late 1920s, the factory premises also housed a school, teaching subjects such as mechanism and ignition, driving, and tyre fitting, while John O’Gorman was largely responsible for the formation of the Irish Motor Traders' Association. The remarkably tidy workshop where bodies for cars and buses were built, as well as the separate building used as the ‘varnish area’, can be seen in the 1922 photographs. Only the first image shown here is dated 1934 and captures the works in greater activity. The final photograph shows an O’Gorman-bodied car, believed to be a Ford.

Words: Jeroen Booij
Pictures: National Library of Ireland

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