The last six months have been very busy for our company, with the usual pre Christmas rush and a very steady start to the New Year.

The current tensions in the Middle East have once again hit fuel prices hard, with diesel prices, at time of writing hovering just below the £1 a litre mark.

On a lighter note, our media profile has been fairly prominent recently with articles in the Road Haulage's journal 'Roadway' and Scotland's Transport News', each telling our story of the last 50 years. Our local newspaper; The Falkirk Herald picked up on the 50th anniversary Corgi Truck story at the beginning of May and several of the national daily newspapers followed up on the tale the next again week with comprehensive coverage of our special little and large trucks.

And finally, just to finish things off nicely - the latest edition of the aforementioned Transport News magazine, which was published on our actual anniversary date (11/5/06), featured a full page picture of our special 50 year truck on the front cover.

Rear View Mirror Special - 1956 & 1981

For this edition's regular glance into the past, we thought it would be appropriate to look at the year the company started and also our 'silver' anniversary, 25 years ago.

1956 was a year of very hard work for the new haulier; John Mitchell and his Albion 4 wheeled lorry. There were plenty cargoes to shift, from the local docks and the nationalised concern of British Road Services, who shared out loads. A local council house building boom in western Edinburgh also ensured that many tons of timber were moved to this area. The truck pictured, above left is another Albion, fleet no. 2, which we think started work towards the end of the first year of John Mitchell's business. The local lads standing proudly in front of it are Colin McMillan and Drew Farquhar.

Elsewhere in the world in 1956, Prince Rainier of Monaco married the beautiful film star; Grace Kelly, Egypt seized the Suez Canal and 4 months later the Allied Forces took it back, all of which caused panic at the pumps, with petrol rationing brought in until May the following year.

By 1981 the distinctive maroon and grey livery of John Mitchell now adorned the sides of around 22 trucks and in the September of this year, a young traffic office administration assistant by the name of Catherine Mitchell, married local lad Robert Weir. The fleet operated from a then, slightly smaller 3 acre site at our Earls Road Industrial Estate base, with maximum weight 32 ton artics covering the length and breadth of the United Kingdom. The ERF 'B' series tractor unit, pictured right, was one of the best British made trucks available then and the reliability and fuel consumption of its Gardner engine was then yet unmatched by continental manufacturers.

The start of the eighties was a bad year for assassination attempts with US president; Ronald Regan and Pope John Paul II, thankfully making lucky recoveries from encounters with deranged gunmen.

As with 1956, the world watched another royal wedding, this time round with His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales and The Lady Diana Spencer.