Blazing Minds

I like the word ‘van’! As an Anglo Saxon, we would see that word differently from the Dutch for example who have a widespread use for it as a surname. We, on the other hand, use it not only as a surname but also to describe vehicles and products. The term ‘van’ originated as a shortened version of ‘caravan’, which originally meant ‘covered vehicle’.

The biggest differences in the usage of the term ‘van’ are seen amongst the English speaking countries, for example in the UK, a passenger minivan is also known as a people-carrier or MPV (multi-purpose vehicle). A larger passenger van is referred to as a minibus. In the USA, they often refer to a ‘van’ as a box shaped trailer used principally to carry goods. They also like to make a distinction between a ‘dry van’ which is used to carry most goods, and a refrigerated van – which is also known as a ‘reefer’, used for cold goods. How then, did this word become associated with marijuana? – Answers on a post card please!

In the States, a van can also refer to a railway car that is used to carry baggage, where as in the UK the term ‘vanguard’ originated from a person who was the driver’s mate. There are lots of different ways of owning a van – outright purchase, van leasing, contracting – the sky’s the limit.

As vans became more clearly defined, they also began to assume characteristics that we either loved or hated, for example who doesn’t love an ice cream van, and who regards a TV detector van with nothing short of animosity? I have been giving some thought to this business of ‘personality’ and have decided to list some of my favourite heroes and zeroes associated with the world of vans.

Heroes
The Ice cream van
As mentioned earlier, the ice cream van – although a giant fridge on wheels – ironically exudes warmth, at least in most people’s hearts. It is the joy-bringer, the signal that it is time to work on your parents to get that treat that has long been promised. Basically in the UK, there are two types of ice cream van: a ‘hard van’ which caters for scoop ice cream and is equipped only with a freezer; and a ‘soft van’ which has a freezer and can also serve machine-delivered ice cream. These vans start their life as a standard factory model, and are usually converted and fitted with fibre-glass parts to keep the weight down to a minimum.

The Mystery Machine
Usually cartoon characters are particularly associated with different generations, such as Tom and Gerry, which has completely missed my daughter’s generation, but was an ever-present in mine. But this is not the case with the Mystery Machine, which first appeared in 1969 with the original series Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! The show has been running ever since in various formats and has not lost its original plot of solving the appearance of an apparent monster. The monster nearly always turns out to be a human in disguise. The Mystery Machine is definitely amongst my favourite ‘vans’ as it conjures up that time in the early seventies when, if you weren’t watching regularly on a Thursday evening after school, then you were a ‘social outcast’ amongst your peers. Whether you liked it or not, you had to be a regular. But hey, I never met anyone who didn’t like it, did you?

Postman Pat’s van
This is another favourite ‘van’ as it carried the legendary Postman Pat, a character similar to Scooby Doo, which has endured over many generations. Postman Pat’s van was a lovely red post van, evoking a period when the postman had to travel to remote areas within a community, and had the ability to string a conversation together. Nowadays, I am likely never to see the individual delivering the post and if I did, I would probably ask him (or her) not to fold my letters in half!

Zeroes
TV Detector vans
“For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction” – according to Sir Isaac Newton, and for every ‘hero’ there must be a ‘zero’. The van that many of us love to hate is the TV detector van, created in an age of austerity in the UK, just after the end of the Second World War. To be honest, like many people, it is just the concept that I despise – a national policy for ‘Snooping’. Like all government policies, there has to be a minister responsible, and in this case the ‘Minister for snooping on your neighbours’ was the Postmaster-General, Lord De La Warr. Detector vans at this time were not the sophisticated models of the modern era, in fact the equipment consisted of nothing more than:

a. Van
b. Two coat hangers
c. Sticky-back plastic

Gradually the situation improved, and the equipment was modified to include three horizontal loop aerials fixed to the roof of a van which received signals from TV sets and converted them to radio waves giving audio and video information. With this technology, nobody was safe, so we they all had to quietly head for the post office and do the decent thing and buy a license!

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