The company was founded in 1926 by J. Stone and Company, Hart Accumulator Company and D. P. Battery Company to manufacture ‘repetition’ parts, They supplied nuts, bolts, screws and fasteners to the motor and aviation industries. They also made magnetos.
By 1937 they advertised their wares as being: Special Washers, Contact Studs, Sleeves, Pole Bolts, Retaining Nuts; Puff Chambers, Split Cones, Reduced Pegs, Precision Repetition Products from the Bar (in all metals), Lighting and Starting Equipment for Marine and Stationary Engines, Easiwork Cookers, Various Inventions, Examples of Automatic Milling, Capstan and Assembly Work.
In 1950 the company was acquired by Midland Bright Drawn Steel and Engineering Company. M.C.L. was another factory which fell victim to the recession of the 1980s.
Jan Seward recalls:
<blockquote>“My late sister owned both a metal giraffe and a Kangaroo made from M.C.L parts. She worked as secretary to the Sales Manager at M.C.L until it closed. There was a display cabinet in the entrance containing a collection of the animals known as the M.C.L Zoo. They were produced by workers in the late 1940’s, early 1950’s, possibly to do with the Festival of Britain. I have contacted the Sales manager who retired 30 years ago, and he told me that they were used at Sales and Industrial Fairs and were pictured in sales literature – alas long gone. The last time that they were exhibited was in the 1970’s at the NEC.”</blockquote>
