NSK’s Newark Facility Celebrates 125 Years of Production

NSK’s factory in Newark on Trent, “The Stanley Works”, is celebrating 125 years of uninterrupted production in 2025.

First established by Allen Ransome all the way back in 1900, the factory has churned out components ever since.

Ransome moved his woodworking company, Allen Ransome & Co., from London to Newark due to the prohibitive cost of land in the capital, opting for Nottinghamshire due to its central location and excellent transport links to the rest of England.

In 1906 the company decided to manufacture its own bearings, working to a design developed by employee Henry Marles. Bearings have been manufactured onsite ever since, indeed demand for the parts outstripped that for all other products as early as 1917.

By 1918, thanks in part to demand generated by the First World War, the Newark factory was producing more than 50,000 bearings every month. The impact of the Great Depression eventually saw the woodworking business sold altogether, meaning the bearings business, now called Ransome & Marles, took over the entire Stanley Works site.

In the decades since, almost every bearing imaginable has been manufactured in Newark. The factory has supplied everyone from manufacturers of white goods to the team behind Concord. Indeed, when it comes to headline projects, components have been made for not just the world-famous supersonic passenger plane, but for Harrier Jump Jets, the De Havilland Comet and many of Britain’s most famous automobiles, including the first ever Mini.

Perhaps most important were the parts supplied for the planes which won the Battle of Britain, with hundreds of bearings contained in every Spitfire and Hurricane, as well as the Lancaster Bombers flown later in the war.

Unsurprisingly, World War Two was a very intense time for The Stanley Works. As a manufacturer of essential parts for the war effort, the factory was a priority target for the Luftwaffe, and, in March 1941, two German air raids in quick succession resulted in the loss of 41 lives.

The war also inspired the establishment of two of the site’s more unique features, its very own hospital and fire brigade. Both were created in the lead up to the war and the latter survived for many decades, with volunteers equipped and trained to home office standard.

NSK Newark

The hospital, which offered the ability to treat minor injuries and shower people down in the event of a gas attack, was bricked up following the outbreak of peace in 1945. It was then largely forgotten about until the 100th anniversary of the site in the year 2000 when it was opened to visitors for a short time in celebration of the centenary.

The post-war years raised significant challenges of their own. As 1970 approached the British Government pressured Ransome and Marles to merge with fellow British firms Hoffmann and Pollard to form RHP, a new company employing 17,500 people across eight factories.

In the 1980s, amidst fierce competition from Eastern Europe, RHP decided to exit the mass-produced bearings market, meaning it no longer produced components for products such as fridges, washing machines and record players. Then, in 1987, the board decided to focus on electrical operations and the entire bearings division was sold.

Just three years later the new parent company, UPI, was purchased by Japanese bearing manufacturer NSK, which still owns the Newark site thirty-five years later. Throughout this upheaval, almost all the other factories across the UK were closed and sold off, but production remained constant in Newark, which is now the only place outside of Asia to manufacture NSK’s top of the range Super Precision Bearings.

Dr Ulrich Nass, CEO of NSK Europe, celebrated the milestone by saying, ‘Reaching 125 years of continuous production is a remarkable achievement and a testament to the resilience, ingenuity and dedication of the Newark team not just today but across all those years. The site has played an extraordinary role in the history of British engineering and I’m sure Newark will continue to thrive in the years ahead.’

A lot has changed in the past 125 years, but the dedication of our people, the passion they bring to their craft and their commitment to excellence remains the same. More than 400 people still come to work at the site Allen Ransome chose and, between them, they pump out around 500,000 bearings a year. That’s half a million products that are the absolute best the market has to offer.

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