ALL OUR CLASSIC MOTORCYCLES HAVE history, no matter whether they are one owner from new, or if that little box on the V5c says ‘number of previous owners 17’. It’s often fascinating to research the bike’s origins... but it’s unlikely that many will find a motorcycle with a history like this Ariel.
The Czech link
First, let us go back to 1926, and a visitor to the UK from Czechoslovakia. In November that year, Mr Hanák, one half of a Prague motorcycle distributor, Štepar, Hanák A Spol (Spol being Czech for Ltd), attended the London Olympia Motorcycle Show, looking for bikes to import. They were already a Levis importer, selling 450 models a year, and the Levis boss directed him to the Ariel stand. After handing a business card to a harassed Ariel sales director who had endured a flood of would-be customers, 12 from Czechoslovakia alone, Mr Hanák said he would visit the Ariel factory. He was convinced he had assured the company of his credentials and went away leaving an order for 50 Ariels. By March 1927, all of them had been sold, and 345 more by the end of the year. In 1928, it sold more than 1000 Ariels and had a 30-strong Czechoslovakian dealer network. The relationship grew from strength to strength, with Ariel owner Jack Sangster making two visits to Prague, where he was entertained lavishly by his customers, one of whom was a dashing young motorcycle racer from the town of Reichenberg-Liberec, one Otto Seidl, of which more on later.
The French connection
Meanwhile (at this point, if this were a Channel 5 documentary, we would pause for a black-and-white film of clouds with a dramatic voiceover), there was a ‘gathering storm’ over Europe. Britain and France abandoned Czechoslovakia with the Munich Agreement and Hitler annexed the country in 1938, partly because he wanted to get his hands on the country’s brilliant armaments industry. The Munich Agreement only bought Britain and France a little time, but it
