Written by Martin Love of The Observer.

Land Rover Defender 90
From £18,905
Miles per gallon: 28.2
CO2 per km: 266 GRAMS
Good for: dirt tracks
Bad for: rare grooves

It’s been a busy year for Huey. He’s appeared at motorshows in Detroit and New York, visited a quarry near Dusseldorf and been to a book launch at Eastnor Castle. Huey, or to give him his full name, HUE 166, is the first Land Rover that was ever built. He rolled off the production line in 1948 and to celebrate his 60th birthday he’s been on a global tour.

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to catch up with him in a field outside Milton Keynes. He may be a little a creaky in his joints, but with the sun glinting on his fresh Keswick-green paint job, he looked in high spirits. Huey’s handler gave me the keys and I clambered in, feeling quite starstruck. I can’t say it was the smoothest drive I’ve ever had. But it was certainly one of the most historic.

Since Huey was introduced in 1948, more than 4m of his brothers and sisters (can a Landy be female? I’m not sure) have travelled to the far corners of the world, working in many of the planet’s most hostile places and, yes, that includes Kensington High Street. Indeed, for thousands of people living in the most remote areas, those early Land Rovers would have been among the first machines many of them would ever have seen.

You may have believed that the Land Rover - the archetypal British battler - came into being as part of the war effort. But the war had been over for three years when Huey was created, and he was actually born into a life of agricultural labour. For years he was known as the Farmer’s Friend.

The first sketch was made in the sand on the beach at Red Wharf Bay in Anglesey by the engineering director of Rover, Maurice Wilks. He wanted a versatile vehicle that could double as a light tractor and off-roader. It was christened the ‘Land Rover’ and his first prototype was built using an American Willys Jeep. The launch price was £450 and in that first year 1,758 vehicles were sold. Today, around 25,000 are sold every year, but many of the original models are still going strong. Series I Land Rovers sent to Costa Rica to work on coffee plantations in the Fifties, for instance, are still in daily use.

To get to know Huey’s ways a little better, I’ve spent the past week driving a Defender 90 - his direct spiritual heir. And it seems his spartan approach to life has survived almost perfectly intact. Everything is built to be indestructible and easy to use. The switches are enormous and are labelled ON or OFF. There’s no Softie Walter creature comforts. No gimmickry, no computers, no see-you-home lights. It’s a car that’s made to work hard and won’t break or complain in the process. Compared to the brain-numbing complexity of modern cars, the Defender is a Luddite’s delight. There’s no vanity mirror, no carpeting, no glove compartment. There is a stereo, though - which, tuned to The Archers while I parked in a muddy field for a wet picnic, seemed the perfect way to celebrate Huey’s 60th.

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