Eddie Stobart: The agricultural contractor whose name became an ...

Eddie Stobart, who has died aged 95, was a Cumbrian agricultural contractor whose name became an icon of the road haulage industry and a source of truck-spotting entertainment for generations of bored car passengers.

It was in fact the second of Eddie’s three sons, Edward (1956-2011), who created the Stobart “superbrand” − while Eddie himself, a devout chapel-goer, was content to run a modest village-based business distributing fertiliser, doing contract work for local farmers, running a farm shop and wheeling and dealing at local agricultural auctions.