Whitby Morrison
History
History
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Bryan Whitby (13 May 1932 \- 1 July 2016\), born in Cheshire, started out as a [bodywork](/wiki/Coachbuilder "Coachbuilder") apprentice at J.H. Jennings in [Sandbach](/wiki/Sandbach "Sandbach"), and later did national service in the [Royal Army Ordnance Corps](/wiki/Royal_Army_Ordnance_Corps "Royal Army Ordnance Corps"). He subsequently worked again for Jennings and at Crewe's [Rolls\-Royce](/wiki/Rolls-Royce_Limited "Rolls-Royce Limited") car works before joining [Shavington](/wiki/Shavington_cum_Gresty "Shavington cum Gresty")\-based S.C. Cummins in 1955, working on ice cream vans and [narrowboats](/wiki/Narrowboat "Narrowboat"). He worked with Sid Cummins to develop the Direct Drive System, and, after establishing his own company in 1962, filed a UK patent in [January 1965](/wiki/1965_in_science "1965 in science") for mobile ice cream producing equipment through which [soft serve](/wiki/Soft_serve "Soft serve") units were powered off the van's drive mechanism. He built his first ice cream van in 1965\. All his ice cream vans afterwards followed this design, previously having a separate electrical generator. This system was known elsewhere as [power take\-off](/wiki/Power_take-off "Power take-off") (PTO), and mostly found on [tractors](/wiki/Tractor "Tractor").

Bryan Whitby Engineering Ltd was incorporated on 12 February 1973\. In 1989 it became known as Whitby Morrison, after taking over the Electrofreeze business of Morrison Industries based in [Sholing](/wiki/Sholing "Sholing"), [Southampton](/wiki/Southampton "Southampton"), and in 1998 acquired the Crewe\-based S.C. Cummins brand.

In 2015, Whitby Morrison successfully sued a Yorkshire\-based firm for copying its registered ice\-cream van designs, including exterior and interior bodywork and the direct drive system; the rogue operator had bought a Whitby Morrison van and reverse\-engineered its design to produce 30 fake vans, worth around £2 million, bearing its logo.

In August 2020, two Whitby Morrison vans featured in an episode of the BBC's *[Top Gear](/wiki/Top_Gear_%282002_TV_series%29 "Top Gear (2002 TV series)")* TV show. In March 2022, Whitby Morrison workers appeared in an episode of the BBC regional documentary series, *[We Are England](/wiki/We_Are_England_%282022_TV_programme%29 "We Are England (2022 TV programme)")*.


Where was Bryan Whitby born?