White and Western Star are 2 different manufacturers, always have been. White motors (originally from Cleveland) and Western Star shared components but that's it. Western Star was in Kolona, British Columbia.
Well dang me! When I was a test driver for PACCAR in the mid '70's, PACCAR shared a test track in Madras, OR (a converted WWll B-25 airstrip) with Freightliner, and I will swear on my mother's grave that there were White Western Star trucks down there that were very utilitarian. Look at the yellow one in the collage. It's obvious that they would share components, most all trucks do except Mack: Chassis & frames by Parrish; engines by Cat, Cummins, et al.; transmissions by Eaton, Fuller; axles by Eaton, Timken; brakes by Wagner, Bendix; steering by Saginaw, Eaton; radiators by Harrison, Young; Instruments by AC Delco, Stewart Warner; suspension by Hendrickson, Reyco, et al; and the list goes on. The only things actually manufactured by the truck "manufacturers" was the cab and wiring harnesses. Even IH (before Navistar) had their cabs built by the Budd Body Co. Mack was the exception (except for the Budd cab) whereas it built it's own engines, axles, frames/chassis, suspension, and transmissions in-house
White was a fleet truck whereas Western Star was an owners operators truck.
White became Freightliner, a truck originally speicified by the owners of Consolidated Freightways.
"Con Freight" owned Freightliner since it's inception in the '30's. Consolidated Freightways - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
See White Western Star trucks here: white western star trucks - Google Search
And FWIW, those cool '55 - '57 Ford T-Birds we all love had their bodies manufactured by Budd as well.: D
