Austin A40 Van Cow & Gate LTD
The A40 of 1947 was Austin's first mass market post-war car and marked the debut of a new 1200cc 40bhp OHV engine that was the direct ancestor of the familiar B-Series unit but which was very different in detail. The car was completely new from stem to stern and also featured a new gearbox and front suspension design. The A40 had a separate chassis, which enabled it to be built in a variety of body styles and Austin certainly exploited this. As a four-door it was marketed as the Devon, whilst the two-door was called the Dorset and the convertible was known as the A40-Sports. Its chassis was used almost unaltered to create the A40 Somerset of 1952. The van version, modelled here, was available from 1948 and was produced alongside its pick-up cousin until the range was dropped in 1956 after 140,060 vans/pick-ups had been built. Founded in 1771 by the Gates family as a small grocery shop in Guildford, Surrey. Expansion into the dairy trade followed in 1887 with a new business called The West Surrey Central Dairy. During 1900 they began to sell milk powder to the bakery and catering trade and this followed in 1904 with a link to the medical profession by supplying milk powder to be used as baby food. 1908 saw the first advert for Cow & Gate and by 1920 the Cow & Gate brand was so strongly associated with baby feeding it was adopted as the company name. Today the company is part of Royal Numico a European leader in scientific nutrition for infants. |
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