The red and green Eddie Stobart lorries are a familiar sight on British roads. The company, which now has 2700 lorries, started in Cumbria in 1957 delivering loads for local farmers. It was soon offered a contract with ICI and adopted the red and green livery for its lorries. They gave each lorry a name, usually female, which started a nationwide game for families competing to spot the different lorries on the road. In 1976 Eddie handed the running of the business over to his son Edward Jr who was a much better businessman than his father. Eddie died in November 2024 at the age of 95.
Eddie’s parents were farmers and Christians and provided a secure family upbringing for their children. Eddie left Howbeck village school at the age of 14. He said: “I quite enjoyed arithmetic, but I could never spell. I was much more interested in catching rabbits.” He took the rabbits to the Saturday covered market in Carlisle to make some pocket money. After a year he had saved enough to buy an unbroken horse for 33 guineas, training it to pull carts and machinery and selling it 12 months later for 66 guineas. Eventually he was able to buy a tractor and threshing machine which he used to work for local farmers.
Eddie became a Christian in 1946 when he received Jesus Christ as his Saviour at a local Methodist chapel, going forward to tell the preacher he had been saved. He later heard about a 17-year-old girl, Nora Boyd, who had also been saved. They arranged to meet at a Bible rally in Carlisle and married on Boxing Day 1951. They had a daughter, Anne, and three sons, Edward, John and William. They were all taken to Sunday school every week. Although Eddie did well enough to buy a Morris Oxford car, the children had to make do with second-hand bikes and summer holidays at guest houses in Cornwall or Devon.
Eddie belonged to the Gideons who take Bibles to schools, hospitals and prisons. He also preached in local churches and provided hospitality to visiting preachers. Eddie never worked at weekends. Saturday was for his children and Sunday was for God. In retirement Eddie and Nora lived in a bungalow outside Carlisle and were active members of the Free Evangelical Church and helped fund its new building at Wigton. They were proud of what their sons, particularly Edward, achieved. But Eddie insisted he would never have given the company his own name if he had realised it would become a nationally known brand. He said, “I never aimed to devote myself to work, we are here to serve God, not Mammon.”