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Jack Brown
• J. T. Brown is more readily recognized as the moving spirit behind the Vehicle Observer Corps and the vehicles security committee (of which he is chairman) than he is in his role as managing director of Atlas Express Ltd. This is despite the fact that Jack has been with Atlas man and boy since 1935, while the VOC has only been in existence since 1962.
He left school and trained as an engineering draughtsman but there was little scope for such skill back in the Thirties. Sheer necessity drove Jack Brown into transport and today he will tell you that he would not change his profession if he were starting life all over again.
Born within the sound of Bow Bells 54 years ago. Jack now lives in Chigwell but remains intensely loyal to East London; it was this loyalty which created, in his mind, the concept of the VOC.
Atlas Express has its London headquarters at Rotherhithe and the incidence of vehicle thefts, which were eventually traced to residents of other areas, converted Jack Brown to a "thief catcher". He is frequently mistaken for a senior police officer—but then he spends a great deal of his free time in the company of the professional law men, ever striving to improve the public image of road transport Under his leadership, the VOC record can only be described as remarkable. In June 1962, vehicles were disappearing at the rate of two a day in South East London. Within sis: months they had been reduced to three in six months. The 1968 national theft figures are the lowest on record; the 1969 are not yet available.
His early engineering training encouraged Jack Brown to design and build the first ever anti-theft alarm made specifically for a commercial vehicle. He chuckles when he relates how, in 1953, the first vehicle to befitted was stolen when loaded with carpets. When the driver returned to where the vehicle had been parked he heard the alarm sounding only a few streets away and, with the aid of a passing motorist, the thieves Were quickly apprehended and the load recovered intact.
This man who borrowed-a bicycle to attend his initial interview in 1935. is now a member of the Institute of Transport and controls a fleet of 500 vehicles and 1800 trailers.
I looked at the .22 rifle which stands in the corner of Jack Brown's office. He noticed my inquiring glance and laughed. "That's for my other sport. The VOC is not yet armed." 1.8.