This article was originally posted on the BBC website and can be found here A Brief History of the VW Type II Bus

The birth of the VW Type II (Type I being the Beetle) arose after World War II when the British found themselves running the VW factory in Wolfsburg Germany. Ben Pon, a Dutch VW importer, saw the motorised trolleys built using stripped down Beetle chassis and running gear taking parts around the vast factory in 1947. He sketched a design for a beetle-based van, which looked rather like a box on wheels, after he was inspired by these rudimentary but ingenious vehicles. Heinz Nordhoff took on this idea a year later when he took over as chief executive of Volkswagen and the first VW van was launched at the Geneva Motor Show in November 1949.