Postwar
Standard 14 signwritten for Ferguson
Hello Phil,
The photo of the delightful van belonging to the Belgian
patisseur reminded me of a picture I have meant to send you
a long time. It shows a 1947 Standard 14 unexpectedly as a van.
It was operated by AB Farming, the Swedish importers of the
Ferguson tractor. AB Farming was a
subsidiary of ANA, sole distributors from 1945 of Standard cars
in Sweden. The car meet in June this year celebrating ANA's
establishment 70 years ago was recently well reported on for the
web-site by Swedish member Stefan Gustavsson. ANA stands for AB
Nyköpings Automobilfabrik (the car factory in the town of Nyköping
, AB meaning Ltd). As an aside, a statement somewhere on
the website that it was "set up by Black to assemble
Vanguards" is unfortunately not correct. It was established
back in 1937 to assemble US Chrysler products. In the post-war
dollar squeeze they turned to European makes and the Standard
Vanguard was their mainstay for many years being sold as an
"English car of American type" always depicted in ads
head-on to disguise its short wheelbase!
We all sense that normally it would be beneath a Standard 14 to
appear in the guise of a commercial vehicle, but as a service
van it must have put up a good show for the tractor business.
This van has unfortunately not survived for all I know and it is
not known either if there were other examples. The only
information I have is the enclosed image, from which I believe
the following conclusions can be made.
The photo was taken when the van was brand new because it is
still on trade plates. It has just been filled up with
petrol from the blue pump with the old-style BP globe. It is
probably sprayed Ferguson grey. I date it as a 1947 model
because it was then ANA took up the tractor business. It is most
certainly a 14, called the 1800 in Sweden, as the British
taxable HP system was not generally understood here (which it no
longer appears to be in the UK either!). There was no sense in
bringing in the 12 HP because in Sweden vehicles are not taxed
on the size of their engines but on curb weight. Most
probably this van is a one-off built in Sweden. In those
days there were a number of local coachbuilders doing commercial
bodywork on various makes of chassis. The rear wings look like
the generic items they might have used. The front doors are
original Standard items. The body is markedly widened towards
the rear and the roof is higher than on the saloon. Just behind
the front door there is the plate then statutory in Sweden
showing the load carrying capacity. There is a period Lucas wing
mirror on the wing but also one rather neatly on the driver's
door. The van is RHD although most Standards sold in Sweden were
as desired by the market LHD despite the fact that in those days
Swedes still drove on the left-hand (proper?) side of the
road.
One wonders on what basis it was built. Cars were so scarce in
those immediate post-war years that it is unlikely that they
converted a brand-new saloon. Either they used an
accident-damaged car or, being the official importers, they had
persuaded the Standard Motor Company to ship them a chassis
without the aft part of the body similar to what must have been
provided to Mulliners as basis for the
"Woody" estate car built by them.
Later on, Vanguard vans were used as service vehicles calling on
farms using Ferguson tractors and the 14 van (vans?) was then
probably decommissioned.
Bo Legelius,Sweden
Thanks for this valuable contribution, Bo.
I have seen other photographs of "Ferguson" 14
Vans, there must have been a whole fleet of them made. Unfortunately,
I can't lay my hands on one presently. I have to say that I
think they were built by or for the factory, most probably by
Mulliners.
