INTERNATIONAL ‘LOADSTAR’

In the mid-sixties International Harvester of America hoped to generate sales in the UK as well as to gain access to the traditional Sterling export markets served by what was then a thriving British truck industry. The famous manufacturer from Chicago, Illinois, launched its UK operations in 1965 but barely eighteen months later the venture collapsed. International, one of America’s oldest and most famous truck makers, had an equally unsuccessful attempt at establishing a German manufacturing operation in Heidelberg around the same time.

It wasn’t of course the company’s first venture in the UK – like a number of other American manufacturers, it once built up a successful British operation between 1923 and the start of World War 2 and, at their peak, sales reached 800 during 1938-39. Rumours of a new assault on the British market broke in mid-1965 and press reports outlining International’s plans began appearing in September