Chuff-chuff-chuffing through the bush

WEBVTT
00:00:00.640 --> 00:00:02.879
G'day, I'm John Francis.
00:00:03.120 --> 00:00:04.480
Pull up a gum leaf.
00:00:04.639 --> 00:00:16.960
Welcome to the Red Dust Tapes Campfire, where we'll sit around listening to fascinating outback characters of the early 20th century recorded by me long ago.
00:00:33.840 --> 00:00:43.840
Chuffing through the bush, in which we rock and rattle back into the early days of Australian rail, including The Railways was vital.
00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:52.240
Number one, they were vital in the shearing industry, all right, because before the the railways came through, people were on horseback.
00:00:52.719 --> 00:00:55.119
Later on they were on cycle, bicycles.
00:00:55.280 --> 00:01:04.640
But when the railways, and they always planned to go back home, see their loved ones, and a lot of them tragically would go to the nearest pub or shanty.
00:01:04.959 --> 00:01:17.439
I read an account of the flies, the dust, and the isolation by a man who was right there with pick and shovel for the building of the Nullabore Railway, the transcontinental.
00:01:22.480 --> 00:01:27.840
And then we rattle along to a later era for the early days of diesel.
00:01:35.599 --> 00:01:40.719
And life in a tiny settlement in the middle of that desolate nullaboar track.
00:01:40.959 --> 00:01:43.040
Good, free, and easy life out of you.
00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:46.719
Nothing much to do over weekends, so you just wander out in the bush.
00:01:46.959 --> 00:01:48.159
Nobody to bother you.
00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:53.599
There must be a lot of people that come from large cities, come out to make some money, but do find it very hard to settle in.
00:01:53.760 --> 00:01:56.079
Oh yeah, there's a heck of a lot of them.
00:01:56.400 --> 00:01:58.799
Matter of fact, we've got a few in the camp at the moment.
00:01:59.200 --> 00:02:03.120
A lot of the women, they uh like the younger ones, they get very depressed, you know.
00:02:03.359 --> 00:02:06.319
They end up getting on their nerve tablets or something.
00:02:06.560 --> 00:02:09.199
They the biggest part of them come from the city.
00:02:09.360 --> 00:02:13.039
Well, they find it very hard to adjust to this kind of life.
00:02:13.120 --> 00:02:18.879
And they get depressed, and there's arguments, and the women want to go back, and then the men they want to stop out of you.
00:02:18.960 --> 00:02:20.719
Well, I was like that at first.
00:02:30.800 --> 00:02:34.800
I'll tell you a funny story about the steam engine recording.
00:02:35.039 --> 00:02:39.919
I was in Perth, not sure when, probably about 1971.
00:02:40.240 --> 00:02:45.120
I was wandering along the street downtown when I heard what was that?
00:02:45.599 --> 00:02:46.800
A steam whistle.
00:02:47.039 --> 00:02:54.319
I went down to the railway yards and sure enough there was an old shunting engine huffing and crying into the air.
00:02:55.199 --> 00:02:56.000
Right oh.
00:02:56.240 --> 00:03:08.240
I phoned the main Perth railway number, was put through to someone somewhere, I told them that I was a journalist, and could I please get a ride on the steam shunting engine to capture the sound?
00:03:08.639 --> 00:03:10.400
The person was incredulous.
00:03:10.719 --> 00:03:13.919
We don't have steam in Perth anymore.
00:03:14.319 --> 00:03:18.319
Well listen, I said, What's that machine in the shunting yards?
00:03:18.560 --> 00:03:28.159
Later that day I was in among the clatter bang and steamy coal smells on the plate of the old girl recording the stuff.
00:04:05.120 --> 00:04:18.160
Back in nineteen sixty-seven, I was briefly, before I got the sack for being useless, the first newsreader at television station GTS 4 in Port Perry in South Australia.
00:04:18.399 --> 00:04:31.680
This was back when television was still in glorious black and white, and because there was no video recording, I'd have to jump out in front of the camera and do the same commercial several times each night.
00:04:31.839 --> 00:04:48.079
Anyway, when I wasn't being paid for being incompetent, I'd sometimes sit in a little coffee shop in Port Peary's main street, and occasionally the quiet moments in this narrow little shopping strip would be obliterated by this sound.
00:05:05.759 --> 00:05:22.399
Yes, the freight trains would clatter puff their way through here, past the cafe, past the post office, past the habadashery shop on their way to the port, whacking the citizens towards deafness and giving them a reason to change their clothes when they got home.
00:05:29.600 --> 00:05:33.439
Yes, yes, all right, you steam train nutters.
00:05:33.600 --> 00:05:40.800
That particular recording was of an engine going way faster than it would be if it was going through a shopping area.
00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:46.240
It's called Gilding the Lily for a bit of dramatic effect, all right.
00:05:53.199 --> 00:05:55.920
Now here's a very interesting thing.
00:05:56.160 --> 00:06:00.959
I lived not far down the road at the back of an SP bookie joint.
00:06:01.199 --> 00:06:07.279
It was a road with a level crossing, a level crossing with a very special claim to fame.
00:06:08.000 --> 00:06:21.600
This crossing had three different railway gauges narrow gauge, that's three foot six inches, standard gauge, that's four foot eight and a half, and broad gauge, five foot three inches.
00:06:22.319 --> 00:06:31.759
Yep, these were the three track widths that Australia had, and to a degree still has today, and going right back to the days of our first railways.
00:06:32.480 --> 00:06:34.720
Whose stupid idea was this?
00:06:35.360 --> 00:06:40.319
Actually there were several stupid people in different Australian colonies.
00:06:40.720 --> 00:06:47.600
Way back in eighteen forty five, Britain had mandated the standard gauge four foot eight and a half.
00:06:48.480 --> 00:07:01.680
That news obviously filtered through to Australia, but somehow the various colonial authorities and individual railway companies found reasons to agree and to disagree.
00:07:01.920 --> 00:07:15.680
It would be 1995 before all Australian state capitals were joined by standard gauge, but away from these main connections there still remain an awful lot of lines on the other gauges.
00:07:15.920 --> 00:07:27.439
One line that was still using narrow gauge in the late 1960s when I was collecting my stories, was the old line from Maury in northern South Australia to Alice Springs.
00:07:27.680 --> 00:07:37.920
This was before the new standard gauge was built further west, which bypassed Maury, and incidentally took the railway line right the way through from Alice Springs to Darwin.
00:07:38.160 --> 00:07:47.519
Back then on the old narrow gauge line, it was a slow and wobbly ride as it meandered largely through sand hill country.
00:07:47.759 --> 00:07:54.079
I once travelled on this old line from Maury to Utnadatta on a mixed train, goods and passengers.
00:07:54.319 --> 00:07:56.720
The guard had many yarns.
00:07:56.959 --> 00:07:58.000
I like this one.
00:07:58.319 --> 00:08:10.079
On days of extreme heat, the train had to slow down so much that you could shoot a rabbit through the open window, hop out to retrieve it, and jump back on while the train was still passing.
00:08:10.319 --> 00:08:13.519
But what was the really early history of Australian railway?
00:08:13.839 --> 00:08:15.600
The railways was vital.
00:08:15.759 --> 00:08:24.000
Number one, they were vital in the shearing industry, all right, because before the the railways came through, people were on horseback.
00:08:24.480 --> 00:08:26.639
Later on they were on cycle bicycles.
00:08:26.959 --> 00:08:32.320
This is early Australian music collector, history researcher and performer Warren Fay.
00:08:32.799 --> 00:08:42.639
But when the railways, and they always planned to go back home, see their loved ones, you know, take their seasons check and go back to the city or wherever they came from.
00:08:42.879 --> 00:09:09.519
And a lot of them tragically would go to the nearest pub or shanty, hand the check over, and the um the it was unwritten law that that the landlord or landlady would let them drink for three days before they threw them in the dead house at the the room at the back of the pub, and then they'd write them uh a check for what was remaining of their seasons check.
00:09:09.600 --> 00:09:10.320
It was a tragedy.
00:09:10.399 --> 00:09:14.000
It was called Lambing Down, you know, fleecing the young lambs.
00:09:14.080 --> 00:09:39.679
And there are a few songs about this lambing down, and it it persisted even in the cities right up to before World War One started, uh, where the the the the shearers or the itinerant workers would be flashed with money and they'd come in and the they the landlady or landlords saw it as their obligation to get sort of try and get the the money out of them as best they can and as much as they could.
00:09:39.840 --> 00:09:42.080
I mean it was a tragedy in the bush, let me tell you.
00:09:42.480 --> 00:09:46.559
It's all for me beer and tobacco.
00:09:48.639 --> 00:10:03.600
Well I spent all meeting in a shantydering now across the western plains I must walk.
00:10:07.440 --> 00:10:12.879
It wasn't until the railways came through that they could hop on a train and they could get somewhere.
00:10:13.039 --> 00:10:16.559
Um so that's for me one of the most important things.
00:10:16.799 --> 00:10:50.879
Um but it was a trial putting a railway through such a big country, as you can imagine, and certainly in New South Wales, where they did a railway, they started it in 1850 to go from Sydney to Parramatta, where the other big settlement was, and it was only 14 miles, uh, but it took five years to finish because they kept bringing out shiploads of railway navies who'd worked on railways in England and Ireland, and they'd arrive and um they'd hear of the gold rush.
00:10:50.960 --> 00:10:54.720
And they said, Well, am I bloody well working on a railway?
00:10:54.960 --> 00:11:05.440
I could be going out and picking out bumps of gold, and they'd hot foot it, probably pinch the shovel and pick they were working with and hot foot it up to the gold fields.
00:11:05.519 --> 00:11:08.080
And the same thing happened in in Victoria.
00:11:08.399 --> 00:11:15.200
Digging holes in the ground where there's gold to be found, and most times where gold is not.
00:11:16.240 --> 00:11:22.879
A man's like a rabbit with his digging habit, and like one he ought to be shot.
00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:43.279
The railway has a very important part, uh role in Australia's history, and of course, there were lots of songs about railways, lots about railway strikes, lots about the railway refreshment rooms, which were really important um uh with the the story of the railway.
00:11:43.360 --> 00:11:57.519
Um, there was a great song that came out of um Queensland in the uh in the 1950s by a group called the Brisbane Realist Writers Group, I think it was called.
00:11:57.759 --> 00:12:09.039
It was published in a very early book called the Queensland centenary pocket songbook, but it um it had lines, it was once again, it's pretty much doggeral.
00:12:09.120 --> 00:12:14.879
Um, on the Queensland Railway lines, there are stationed where once dines.
00:12:15.360 --> 00:12:30.320
Private individuals also run refreshment rooms, Bogan Tung and Rolling Stone, Mungamergen Marathon, Garthamonga, Pinkin Bar, Wanko Yamba, ha ha ha.
00:12:30.480 --> 00:12:31.600
You know the tune.
00:12:31.840 --> 00:12:44.080
And then it's got uh pies and coffees, baths and showers are supplied at charters towers at Mackay the rule prevails of restricting shows to males.
00:12:44.480 --> 00:12:49.360
Iron rations come in handy on the way to Diran Bandy.
00:12:49.519 --> 00:12:54.559
Passengers have died of hunger during halts at Garadunga.
00:12:54.960 --> 00:13:16.480
Let us toast before we part those who travel stout of heart, drunk or sober, rain or shine on the Queensland railway line, Togan Tung Rolling Stone, Munger Murgan Marathon, Garda Lungra, Pink and Bar, Wanko Yamba, ha ha ha.
00:13:18.960 --> 00:13:22.799
As Warren says, a fun song, but really just doggeral.
00:13:23.039 --> 00:13:27.360
So were there any songs that offered insight into railways and the way of life?
00:13:27.600 --> 00:13:28.399
Not much.
00:13:29.039 --> 00:13:30.080
I don't think so.
00:13:30.240 --> 00:13:40.879
The stories my favorite story about the railways, without a doubt, is um, you know, the railway refreshment rooms, the triple R, which were famous.
00:13:41.039 --> 00:13:52.000
The train would slow down and the guard would say, Ten minutes, ladies and gentlemen, the tea and coffee and pies and sandwiches are ready in the railway refreshment room.
00:13:52.320 --> 00:14:00.080
And then everybody would stampede down to these little railway refreshment rooms, and these waitresses would be there all waiting.
00:14:00.240 --> 00:14:06.879
Anyway, this fella comes in and uh he looks at the waitress, he's not obviously not having a good morning.
00:14:06.960 --> 00:14:08.320
She goes, What do you want?
00:14:08.559 --> 00:14:13.200
And um he goes, Um, a couple of kind words.
00:14:13.679 --> 00:14:14.879
What do you want?
00:14:15.200 --> 00:14:17.360
Oh, I'll have the pie.
00:14:18.159 --> 00:14:23.039
Uh and he she looks at him, he looks at him, and uh he says, How much?
00:14:23.200 --> 00:14:30.399
She says, Two shillings, and he passes it over, and he said, uh, and uh anything else you'd recommend?
00:14:30.720 --> 00:14:32.159
Don't eat the pie.
00:14:35.039 --> 00:14:47.919
Coming back to railway songs for a moment, here's a little ditty from Warren's collection, which no doubt was a favourite in pubs and in the settlers' camps at night after a few beers.
00:14:48.320 --> 00:14:53.519
But if you're a little tender, I do urge you to cover your ears for the last part.
00:14:54.080 --> 00:15:04.080
This is uh, you know, the railway nabbies, they they were renowned drinkers and they used to a bit like the sailors had a girl in every port, they had a girl in every town.
00:15:04.320 --> 00:15:10.799
Um and there was a ditty that went to the tune of like it was an old bush dance tune, actually.
00:15:11.200 --> 00:15:14.879
I'm a nabby, I'm a nabby, I'm a nabby on the line.
00:15:15.039 --> 00:15:18.720
I get four and twenty Bob a week besides me over time.
00:15:18.960 --> 00:15:22.720
All the ladies love the nabbies, and the nabbies love their fun.
00:15:22.879 --> 00:15:27.200
There'll be lots of little nabbies when the railway's done.
00:15:27.440 --> 00:15:35.039
Some like the girls who are slender in the waist, others like the girls who are pretty in the face.
00:15:35.600 --> 00:15:43.759
I like the girl who'll take it in her fist and shove it right home into the magpie's nest.
00:15:49.440 --> 00:15:57.600
I want to take you now across to the Nullabor Plain, to the building of what must surely be the most unique line in Australia.
00:15:58.320 --> 00:16:09.759
The Nullabor Line is one thousand seven hundred and ten kilometres from Port Augusta in South Australia to Kalgoolie in Western Australia, part of the Transcontinental Railway Line.
00:16:10.159 --> 00:16:21.200
The majority is over real desert country, and its name gives you a clue null arbor, no trees, for the vast majority of the distance anyway.
00:16:21.440 --> 00:16:30.159
And it has a very special claim to fame with the longest straight stretch of line in the world, 478 kilometres.
00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:44.080
And while it replaced the camel as the only really viable means for transport out there, it was largely thanks to the camel that it could be built in the first place.
00:16:44.320 --> 00:16:53.600
They hauled the loads, and they and horse teams, dragging scoops, smoothed and heaped the earth to form the bed for the railway sleepers.
00:16:53.840 --> 00:17:03.600
Patsy Adams Smith, a wonderful chronicler of earlier days in Australia, wrote a fabulous book called Folklore of the Australian Railway Men.
00:17:04.240 --> 00:17:12.079
One of the people featured in her book is Bill Twilley, who said he started work on the construction of the line in 1914.
00:17:12.319 --> 00:17:15.119
Bill was a labourer and then a train driver.
00:17:15.599 --> 00:17:18.160
Here are excerpts from his letters to Patsy.
00:17:19.039 --> 00:17:20.160
It was a tough job.
00:17:20.640 --> 00:17:22.799
I doubt if we will ever see again.
00:17:23.119 --> 00:17:30.000
Men work under the conditions men on the Trans Australia did with horses, camels, shovels and picks.
00:17:30.400 --> 00:17:35.759
Remember that on this 900 miles not one stream of water crossed.
00:17:36.079 --> 00:17:37.440
No man lived.
00:17:37.680 --> 00:17:38.400
Well, okay.
00:17:38.880 --> 00:17:42.079
Ignoring the Aboriginal people, but that's what they did in those days.
00:17:42.400 --> 00:17:49.680
No man lived, and the land was so flat, no tunnel had to be built, and no bridge across gulches.
00:17:49.920 --> 00:17:58.079
We lived in tent houses, sometimes wood part way up with canvas top, sometimes a cutting in the earth, with a tent above that.
00:17:58.400 --> 00:18:03.039
Willy willies, when they came, swept in and blew the top off of these houses.
00:18:03.279 --> 00:18:11.039
I saw a man near our tent house left standing amongst his furniture with his roof gone in the wind of the willy willy.
00:18:11.200 --> 00:18:20.079
Even as a line was built, we had to use sand scoops fastened on the front of a slow moving train to keep the sand off the line.
00:18:20.400 --> 00:18:28.880
We kept flour, baking powder, pepper, salt on hand, in case we were cut off, and of course vinegar and onions for the turkeys.
00:18:29.039 --> 00:18:31.680
We used to get about two wild turkeys a week.
00:18:31.839 --> 00:18:38.079
We'd rub them with vinegar and put an onion inside them and hang them out for a bit and then cook them in a kerosene tin.
00:18:38.400 --> 00:18:39.519
They were good eating.
00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:43.359
We kept our food cool by digging a hole in the ground.
00:18:43.680 --> 00:18:50.559
There were a few settlers scattered over the Nullabor near Pimba, and they'd come out with camels hitched to their buggies.
00:18:50.720 --> 00:18:54.880
The ladies would sit there in their long white dresses and big hats.
00:18:55.200 --> 00:19:01.920
Lots of people thought camels would be more important than the new cars out there away from the railhead.
00:19:02.079 --> 00:19:06.079
I saw an Afghan sell eight camels for a hundred pounds each.
00:19:06.400 --> 00:19:10.079
Few of the settlers were doing more than live on their overdraft.
00:19:10.319 --> 00:19:25.680
The railway at Pimber gave work to the men and their horses that had been driven off the land up Cornway, where the sand rolled in and hid their land, fences, houses, everything in the big drought that was all over Australia in nineteen fourteen.
00:19:25.920 --> 00:19:30.079
They'd never known it easy, and now they knew it even harder still.
00:19:30.319 --> 00:19:37.279
Some said railway work was better than farming, not so lonely, and it wasn't like working for a hard boss.
00:19:37.519 --> 00:19:44.240
A good ganger on these lines would overlook a lapse of a day on the booze, or crook with a hangover.
00:19:44.480 --> 00:19:52.240
When a man turned up next morning he'd say Now let's get a day's work out of you, and by God they gave it to him.
00:19:52.559 --> 00:19:58.240
As the line moved further out, men shifted camp every couple of weeks to keep near the work.
00:19:58.480 --> 00:20:15.119
A butcher bread and stores train came out once a week with fresh provisions, but we had nowhere to store food, no ice or anything, and in that heat, often over a hundred degrees in the shade, the bread was a rock in one day, and we had to eat the meat the day we got it.
00:20:15.599 --> 00:20:35.279
Later, when I began to work the engines, I'd be on that tea and sugar train, and we'd take a long time to get out to the railhead in the dark, and we'd come along near where we knew there was a camp and blow the whistle, and out they'd come with hurricane lamps from their tents, men and women with sugar bags to carry their foodstuffs in.
00:20:35.519 --> 00:20:48.079
The butcher's van had a section for live sheep, for slaughtering, a counter as a shop, and at one end there was the butcher's bed, but as we stopped every half hour or so at a camp, I don't think he got much sleep.
00:20:48.319 --> 00:20:59.519
We had a few second hand engines from the New South Wales Railways to build the line, and we only had boar water to use, and this ate away the copper plates and the tubes in the boilers.
00:20:59.680 --> 00:21:17.519
The tubes would then leak, and we'd be hours late, steam blowing out over our faces and into the fire, preventing it from getting up any steam, and we'd have to stop and take on more water, and we'd eventually get to Port Augusta and they'd be waiting for our engine to take the next train out.
00:21:17.759 --> 00:21:31.519
They'd have men waiting to knock the fire out, blow the steam from the boiler, and I've seen boiler makers getting bags to stand on or sit on on the hot metal as they tried to repair the boiler tubes.
00:21:31.759 --> 00:21:39.039
The engines were so poor and the bore water so bad for them that loco depots were put along the line.
00:21:39.200 --> 00:21:45.200
They were staffed by a fitter and a mate, a boiler maker and mate, and a fuel man to coal the engine.
00:21:45.359 --> 00:21:48.400
There were loco depots at roughly every hundred miles.
00:21:48.640 --> 00:21:52.079
Some of the crews brought their families out to these depots.
00:21:52.240 --> 00:21:54.319
It was hard living for a woman.
00:21:54.559 --> 00:21:57.279
The navies on the line had a hard life.
00:21:57.519 --> 00:21:59.759
They lived in tents with an old wire streak.
00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:06.079
Stretcher, water in a kerosene tin, no shower, but a half and a half bath once a week.
00:22:06.480 --> 00:22:08.880
For this you got a kerosene tin of water.
00:22:09.119 --> 00:22:18.400
You put a bag on the dirt floor beside it, you put your right leg in and wash that side of your body, then stepped out and put your left leg in and washed that side.
00:22:18.720 --> 00:22:20.960
Then you used the water to wash your clothes.
00:22:21.279 --> 00:22:22.559
That was Sunday work.
00:22:23.119 --> 00:22:28.480
When my wife and two children came out with me to wear a mimic, I put up two tents for us.
00:22:28.640 --> 00:22:34.319
We had a couple of stretches, a bedding, a table, two chairs, a frying pan, and a billy can.
00:22:34.880 --> 00:22:43.119
I dug a hole in the ground for a fire, and hung the billy over that for a cup of tea, and said, Well, mum, that's home.
00:22:43.359 --> 00:22:45.200
There was no other woman there.
00:22:45.759 --> 00:22:52.960
A mile away was a black camp, about a hundred of them with dogs, and they'd come around our camp to cadge for food.
00:22:53.119 --> 00:22:56.559
But they'd be lucky if they got any, because we only got ours once a week.
00:22:56.880 --> 00:22:58.079
There was no doctor.
00:22:58.240 --> 00:23:07.440
The men had a bottle of the painkiller, two shillings a bottle, and you took a few drops in water when you got sick in the stomach, and you had epsom salts for the weekend.
00:23:08.000 --> 00:23:10.799
Not too sure why they needed that on a weekend, but anyway.
00:23:11.039 --> 00:23:18.480
I had a little flask of brandy, eucalyptus, and olive oil, and I'd mix that in a bottle as an embrocation.
00:23:18.880 --> 00:23:26.640
When the children got a cold, I'd warm the bottle in warm water and rub their chests and backs, and put them into bed in the tents.
00:23:26.960 --> 00:23:36.799
When they got a bit sick, I would warm a little water over the candle, put it in a spoon with a little sugar and brandy, and we didn't trouble the doctor for twenty years.
00:23:37.359 --> 00:23:41.200
The further the line got out, the harder it was for the old engines.
00:23:41.599 --> 00:23:48.000
Soon as the line got well into the desert lands, we were full time trying to keep the water and coal up to them.
00:23:48.160 --> 00:23:53.519
The stables along the line for the two hundred horses that were worked there came in very handy.
00:23:53.839 --> 00:24:06.559
We always carried a bag of horse manure, and if the tubes in the boiler started to leak, we forced water and manure into the boiler, and it would force the leeks to take up and help get the train home.
00:24:07.279 --> 00:24:10.079
They certainly had their incidents on the line, that's for sure.
00:24:10.400 --> 00:24:11.440
Here's a beauty.
00:24:11.680 --> 00:24:19.759
This day we had two engines in trouble, so they made a double header out of it, and set off to take the train with the pay car out to the camps.
00:24:20.240 --> 00:24:25.519
Arthur Jones, one of the pommy drivers, he was driving one, and Bernie McBride the other.
00:24:25.680 --> 00:24:28.160
And we're rapper, they had to pick up a truck.
00:24:28.640 --> 00:24:33.599
The guard got off to shunt, and he needed a little bump to get his truck to couple up.
00:24:33.920 --> 00:24:38.559
But the foreman saw the green light, and he said, Right away, Arthur.
00:24:38.799 --> 00:24:48.000
He whistled the second engine, right away, and off they went, leaving the guard and the truck behind them at Werrapper.
00:24:48.480 --> 00:24:54.480
There's a bit of a rise out there, and Arthur Jones said to his foreman, By Jove, we're going well.
00:24:54.720 --> 00:24:56.720
Old Barney's putting in well.
00:24:57.119 --> 00:25:02.400
On the engine behind, Barney was saying to his fireman, Arthur's doing a good job tonight.
00:25:02.880 --> 00:25:11.519
When they got to birthday siding, Arthur was oiling his engine, and one of the men from the gang came up and said, Where's the pay van?
00:25:12.000 --> 00:25:14.160
On the other end of the train, said Arthur.
00:25:14.400 --> 00:25:15.119
No, it's not.
00:25:15.200 --> 00:25:16.319
I've been there.
00:25:16.720 --> 00:25:20.640
Arthur said, It's a long train, you didn't walk far enough.
00:25:20.960 --> 00:25:24.880
Then the station master came up and told him that he'd lost half his train.
00:25:25.440 --> 00:25:34.160
In the construction days there was always someone who's ly grogging, and this 125-mile camp was the worst of them all.
00:25:34.559 --> 00:25:35.759
It was in a hollow.
00:25:35.920 --> 00:25:40.400
Three hundred men were camped there, there was no hygiene or sanitation.
00:25:40.559 --> 00:25:47.680
The butcher killed his sheep there beside the tent boarding houses, and flies in their thousands were there.
00:25:47.920 --> 00:25:50.240
There was a long camp made of bags.
00:25:50.559 --> 00:25:52.160
That was the gambling school.
00:25:52.480 --> 00:25:55.200
On payday, the men would start up with two up.
00:25:55.440 --> 00:26:09.119
When it got dark, they'd use kerosene lamps and they'd play dice all night, and go on until they were broke, and some would get on the drink, and the next day they'd be so desperate for a bottle, and the sly grog chaps would come out.
00:26:09.440 --> 00:26:19.519
They'd sell grog for twenty shillings a bottle, a lot of money when the pay was about twelve shillings a day, and it'd be a mixture of whiskey, methylated spirits, and water.
00:26:19.839 --> 00:26:26.799
Any camp without women was bad, but this was the worst loneliness because of the country these men had to work in.
00:26:27.200 --> 00:26:28.480
Some of them went mad.
00:26:28.960 --> 00:26:33.680
Sammy Morgan cut his throat and his wrists when he was on the DTs.
00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:38.799
The horse stables were opposite the camp, and they attracted the flies too.
00:26:39.039 --> 00:26:42.720
A fever broke out, and each day men would be going down with it.
00:26:43.039 --> 00:26:51.119
We took them to Port Augusta, and when the hospital was full, we put them in an old railway carriage, and then in a little room in the main street.
00:26:51.440 --> 00:26:54.240
Sometimes they lay out in the paddock on their stretches.
00:26:54.480 --> 00:26:55.440
A few died.
00:26:55.839 --> 00:27:04.400
There was a policeman stationed at each of the big camps to keep law and order, but like an old mining town, these camps had a law of their own.
00:27:04.720 --> 00:27:07.920
If one of the men was no good, the others got on to him.
00:27:08.079 --> 00:27:14.880
They were used to the bush, working, sleep and talking to the flies, all the same day in and day out.
00:27:15.200 --> 00:27:21.839
They didn't need a policeman to keep an order in the camps, and most of the police knew it and got on well with the navvies.
00:27:22.079 --> 00:27:25.839
But one policeman tried to alter their ways and stopped the two-up.
00:27:26.319 --> 00:27:30.559
He was warned to get away from the school, but he would interfere.
00:27:31.119 --> 00:27:37.519
Next time they moved camp to keep up with the railhead, they loaded all the tents except his.
00:27:38.000 --> 00:27:41.039
The ganger told them they must load the police tent.
00:27:41.279 --> 00:27:43.119
They said he could load his own.
00:27:43.359 --> 00:27:50.160
The ganger talked him into loading it, but the train had only gone a couple of miles along the way when a fire broke out.
00:27:50.640 --> 00:27:52.960
The policeman's tent was on fire.
00:27:59.279 --> 00:28:05.440
The sound of the diesel electric loco replaced steam across the Nullabor in 1951.
00:28:05.839 --> 00:28:11.680
And I spent a bit of time across the Nullabor from about 1969 to 1971.
00:28:12.079 --> 00:28:19.839
So coming up is a little radio documentary I made about Cook, a tiny railway settlement, a smack bang in the middle of that line.
00:28:20.079 --> 00:28:24.480
The conditions were much more civilized than when Bill Twilley was describing it.
00:28:24.799 --> 00:28:26.400
But it was still pretty basic.
00:28:26.559 --> 00:28:33.200
It was an isolated, lonely life, especially for the fettlers camps, where just a handful of men would be stationed.
00:28:33.519 --> 00:28:37.119
And the fettlers were a ragtag mix of humanity.
00:28:37.599 --> 00:28:41.680
Many had dark reasons for hiding away from civilization.
00:28:42.240 --> 00:29:01.200
I can remember back in the sixties and seventies, there'd be some sort of violent incident, including a murder or two, in one of these tiny collections of men-only tin huts, isolated as they were out on the endless, windswept, cold or hot as hell, endless, endless, treeless plain.
00:29:11.680 --> 00:29:16.799
Outside the railway carriage, the earth is like coarse yellow sandpaper.
00:29:16.960 --> 00:29:21.359
There's nothing to be seen out of the south windows, and nothing out of the north.
00:29:21.599 --> 00:29:24.960
And up front of the train, beyond the engine, nothing.
00:29:25.200 --> 00:29:27.680
Behind the guards van, nothing.
00:29:28.079 --> 00:29:35.200
Just flatness stretching out to every horizon and cut in two by the endless, bendless silver railway.
00:29:59.839 --> 00:30:03.759
Alongside the track stands a small brick railway station.
00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:08.880
Behind it, a dozen houses with wide verandahs shine in the heat.
00:30:09.200 --> 00:30:12.799
A two-roomed schoolhouse stands apart from the houses.
00:30:13.599 --> 00:30:20.079
And on a pole in the schoolyard, the blue Australian flag hangs limp like a thirsty tongue.
00:30:21.119 --> 00:30:25.759
This is Cook, the halfway point of the Nullabor Railway.
00:30:26.319 --> 00:30:36.960
Now, in my little documentary, since this was decades before digital communication, it's amusing to hear how the stationmaster kept in touch with the train traffic.
00:30:37.359 --> 00:30:37.839
Cook.
00:30:39.839 --> 00:30:44.880
Could I have an order for train number 673 fast goods to Kalgooli, please?
00:30:45.119 --> 00:30:46.319
Yes, right, Alan.
00:30:46.799 --> 00:30:48.079
Train order 597.
00:30:48.559 --> 00:30:52.240
The station master sits in his office and telephones Port Augusta.
00:30:52.640 --> 00:30:56.799
He's expecting another train soon, this time bound from east to west.
00:30:56.880 --> 00:31:00.160
And he's seeking information about the train from the control center.
00:31:00.319 --> 00:31:08.480
Cross Mixed 536, F I V E T H R E S I X, Engine GM18, O and E I G H T.
00:31:08.880 --> 00:31:21.759
Stop your train at the 571 F I V E S E V N O N E mile, 700, S E V N N A G H T chain, until hand signal forward account relaying gang.
00:31:22.000 --> 00:31:24.400
Received at Cook at 117 p.m.
00:31:24.799 --> 00:31:27.599
Repeated from Cook at 118 p.m.
00:31:28.079 --> 00:31:28.240
P.
00:31:28.480 --> 00:31:31.759
Wallace train controller Lar Hickey Station Master.
00:31:32.000 --> 00:31:32.799
Thank you, Phil.
00:31:32.960 --> 00:31:33.839
I'm M Gut.
00:31:35.279 --> 00:31:49.680
I was speaking to Port Augusta, some 513 miles from me here at Cook, and he is the man who controls all the trains running from or between Port Augusta and Calgoole.
00:31:50.160 --> 00:31:54.160
He is the man who knows where every train is at any given moment.
00:31:54.400 --> 00:31:57.680
And safety is the major factor here.
00:31:58.000 --> 00:32:00.559
There are many men working on the railway line.
00:32:00.799 --> 00:32:03.279
These people must know where the trains are.
00:32:03.599 --> 00:32:06.000
The driver must know what's in front of him.
00:32:06.160 --> 00:32:12.960
Everything is double-checked so as that the safety factor is never overlooked.
00:32:13.200 --> 00:32:20.000
To make sure that you don't have two trains running headlong into one another, this is something we can never afford to have.
00:32:20.319 --> 00:32:26.160
The next train won't be through for an hour or so, so the station master walks home for some lunch.
00:32:26.400 --> 00:32:30.799
He's a short, round little man with a ruddy face and a casual manner.
00:32:31.039 --> 00:32:35.920
Instead of the usual station master's cap, he wears a floppy orange wash hat.
00:32:36.160 --> 00:32:43.119
He looks like a friendly wombat as he ambles across the wide stretch of dust and rocks between the station and his house.
00:32:43.359 --> 00:32:45.519
I'm quite happy with the railways.
00:32:45.680 --> 00:32:52.960
I enjoy the work, and um my family, uh their railway mind it also, because this is our life here.
00:32:53.039 --> 00:32:54.960
There's nothing else other than railways.
00:32:55.119 --> 00:32:58.960
They know all the train numbers, and uh we have uh quite a good time out here.
00:32:59.039 --> 00:33:00.079
We really enjoy it.
00:33:00.240 --> 00:33:11.759
Yes, I suppose your your whole the lives of everyone, not just the people who work in the railways, the the the fathers, but uh the children and the wives would very much their lives would revolve around the uh the railways and the trains that pass by.
00:33:12.079 --> 00:33:22.480
Yes, they do, because uh that's the employment that the husband is in, and uh so naturally everyone's involved in in that in is in the families and involved in the with the railways in some way.
00:33:22.799 --> 00:33:25.839
Plus the fact that there's not very much else to look at except trains.
00:33:26.079 --> 00:33:36.559
No, there's very little else, plus apart from trains, it's uh you know not much else, just a few houses, and but that's the only activity really is the trains that are going through.
00:33:38.079 --> 00:33:42.559
Well, gentlemen, your train will be arriving at uh quarter to uh two.
00:33:43.279 --> 00:33:51.599
The westbound goods train is due shortly, so it's time for the station master to call the relieving train crew from their rest house.
00:33:51.839 --> 00:33:53.279
Okay, we're going straight away?
00:33:53.519 --> 00:33:54.480
We're going straight away.
00:33:54.559 --> 00:33:57.359
You're going to cross it, Hughes with the um clean sugar.
00:33:57.599 --> 00:33:58.319
Any shunt?
00:33:58.400 --> 00:33:59.680
No shunt at Cook.
00:33:59.839 --> 00:34:01.440
Okay, well, let's go.
00:34:01.839 --> 00:34:12.880
It takes four different crews to drive a train on the long nullaboard journey, and the Cook Rest House is one of several at different points along the line where off-duty crews can eat and sleep.
00:34:14.880 --> 00:34:16.239
Uh how did I say how long it was?
00:34:17.199 --> 00:34:20.000
It looks to be about it looks to be about 50 in length.
00:34:20.239 --> 00:34:27.760
The train has arrived, and the relieving driver and his firemen refuel their diesel locomotive through thick rubber hoses.
00:34:28.000 --> 00:34:36.320
We check to see that there's nothing dragging or hanging down, that all the wheels are okay, there's there's um nothing broken, and we've got plenty of fuel and water and oil.
00:34:36.800 --> 00:34:38.880
Ron, where do you take the train from here?
00:34:39.119 --> 00:34:44.719
We take it from here to Rolin at a distance of uh 303 miles, and it'll take us approximately uh about nine hours.
00:34:44.960 --> 00:34:47.039
Rollin' as well over the Western Australian border.
00:34:47.199 --> 00:34:48.320
Oh yes, quite a deal.
00:34:48.400 --> 00:34:51.920
It's a good uh 200 mile over the West Australian border.
00:34:52.239 --> 00:34:55.199
Do you ever see any unusual sites out here?
00:34:55.519 --> 00:34:59.440
Oh yes, we uh see what we consider to be unusual sites, you know.
00:34:59.840 --> 00:35:08.079
Occasional camel, uh we do see quite a bit of wildlife in the form of dingos and uh turkeys and uh thousands of rabbits and lots of foxes.
00:35:08.320 --> 00:35:21.519
But uh night time we see a few strange things like uh comets and uh falling meteorites and the things that people don't see in the city is because uh they're so hemmed in, whereas out here we've got the whole sky we can see from back to front.
00:35:21.760 --> 00:35:23.679
And it's also much clearer out here, I suppose.
00:35:23.760 --> 00:35:27.199
You don't have the same amount of clouds and you don't have any smoke over the city.
00:35:27.440 --> 00:35:28.400
No, nothing at all.
00:35:28.639 --> 00:35:33.920
The air's fresh and clean, and in fact uh these last few nights it's been uh shockingly cold.
00:35:34.320 --> 00:35:36.960
Temperature's been down to about 33 degrees, which is fairly cool.
00:35:37.199 --> 00:35:39.599
Then again in the summertime, I suppose it's just the opposite.
00:35:39.760 --> 00:35:42.880
Oh yes, it's uh stinking hot, really hot in the summertime.
00:35:42.960 --> 00:35:46.719
We uh I've seen it uh up around the 119, 121 in the cab.
00:35:46.960 --> 00:35:49.199
Back in the initial rim, it must be somewhere near 150.
00:35:49.440 --> 00:35:53.199
Everything's hot, everything you touch is hot and uh it's pretty uncomfortable.
00:35:53.280 --> 00:35:54.719
We lose a lot of sweat.
00:36:02.559 --> 00:36:05.360
The train is ready to leave for the West.
00:36:19.280 --> 00:36:22.159
Once again, Cook lies quiet.
00:36:22.559 --> 00:36:24.639
It's now late afternoon.
00:36:24.880 --> 00:36:26.000
School is out.
00:36:26.159 --> 00:36:31.840
Children play around the railway yards or sit under shady verandas doing their homework.
00:36:32.159 --> 00:36:38.159
In a house next door to the school, the schoolmaster and his wife relax with a cool drink.
00:36:38.639 --> 00:36:40.320
We have been here twelve months now.
00:36:40.480 --> 00:36:41.599
What did you think of the place?
00:36:41.760 --> 00:36:43.440
Had you heard anything about it before you came here?
00:36:43.679 --> 00:36:45.920
No, we'd only heard ghastly things, hadn't we?
00:36:46.159 --> 00:36:47.440
But you were still willing to come here.
00:36:47.920 --> 00:36:49.039
What had you heard about the place?
00:36:49.280 --> 00:36:53.920
Oh, that it was hot and barren and isolated and that sort of thing, I suppose.
00:36:54.159 --> 00:36:57.199
What were your first impressions of Cook when you came off the train?
00:36:57.440 --> 00:37:03.039
Well, I thought, uh, e gad, this is far worse than I could have possibly expected.
00:37:03.199 --> 00:37:08.079
Uh but once again we adjusted to it, and after a few traumatic days, we've settled in.
00:37:08.239 --> 00:37:14.079
They say it's the nullabore plane, nullabore means no trees, and the very first impressions we had were just this.
00:37:14.320 --> 00:37:16.559
Since then we've found that this is not really true.
00:37:16.639 --> 00:37:19.920
There are trees around the place, but you have to go a jolly long way to find them.
00:37:20.159 --> 00:37:22.400
Well, don't you sit there, put on the bed.
00:37:22.719 --> 00:37:23.519
Come on.
00:37:24.639 --> 00:37:27.360
Otherwise, your dad will have a fit.
00:37:27.599 --> 00:37:29.119
I don't want you paying up tonight.
00:37:29.440 --> 00:37:29.679
Good night.
00:37:31.199 --> 00:37:38.159
On the front veranda of another cookhouse, railway fetler Fred Webb and his Aboriginal wife say goodnight to their children.
00:37:41.119 --> 00:37:43.280
Get your grapes, Beaver, and get to bed.
00:37:44.239 --> 00:37:55.199
With the children in bed, Fred Webb, with his rough, unshaven face and wearing a little red beanie, can lean back with a cold beer, relaxed in the cool evening air.
00:37:55.519 --> 00:37:57.679
Good, free, and easy life out of you.
00:37:57.920 --> 00:38:01.280
Nothing much to do over weekend, so you just wander out in the bush.
00:38:01.519 --> 00:38:02.800
Nobody to bother you.
00:38:02.960 --> 00:38:04.320
Have you always lived in the bush?
00:38:04.559 --> 00:38:05.840
All my life.
00:38:06.079 --> 00:38:14.880
Well, from your point of view, then it's it's just the thing for you, but there must be a lot of people that come from large cities, come out to make some money, but do find it very hard to settle in.
00:38:15.119 --> 00:38:17.199
Oh, yeah, there's a heck of a lot of them.
00:38:17.679 --> 00:38:20.079
Matter of fact, we've got a few in the camp at the moment.
00:38:20.480 --> 00:38:24.480
A lot of the women, they uh like the younger ones, they get very depressed, you know.
00:38:24.639 --> 00:38:27.599
They end up getting on their nerve tablets or something.
00:38:27.840 --> 00:38:30.480
They s the biggest part of them come from the city.
00:38:30.639 --> 00:38:34.320
Well, they find it very hard to adjust to this kind of life.
00:38:34.480 --> 00:38:40.079
And they get depressed, and there's arguments, and the women want to go back, and then the men they want to stop out of you.
00:38:40.320 --> 00:38:42.000
Well, I was like that at first.
00:38:42.159 --> 00:38:45.519
Like coming from Adelaide out of you, I found it very hard.
00:38:51.679 --> 00:38:57.599
Not long after the sun has gone, the Indian Pacific passenger train pulls in at Cook.
00:38:57.840 --> 00:39:00.880
The silver carriages shine in the moonlight.
00:39:01.119 --> 00:39:07.119
While the engine drivers refuel the locomotive, the passengers take the opportunity to stretch their legs.
00:39:07.280 --> 00:39:14.480
I don't know, I feel real good in the train and all, and um, oh, I feel as if I could travel in the train for weeks on end and it wouldn't worry me.
00:39:14.639 --> 00:39:16.800
What do you like most about this kind of travel?
00:39:16.960 --> 00:39:23.519
Um, I suppose you feel at home and oh yeah, you meet plenty of people and I don't know, everything just seems to be so friendly, you know.
00:39:23.679 --> 00:39:25.119
It's real beautiful.
00:39:41.519 --> 00:39:47.599
The Indian Pacific leaves as the moon is rising high in the clear Nullabore sky.
00:39:47.920 --> 00:39:57.840
One or two goods trains will call later in the night, but there'll be no other activity around the tiny township of Cook until the sun rises in the morning.
00:40:05.920 --> 00:40:12.000
At seven o'clock in the morning, the gangs of fettlers head out from Cook along the railway line for the day's work.
00:40:12.159 --> 00:40:17.599
They ride in quad cars, which are tiny motorised buggies that rattle along the tracks.
00:40:33.119 --> 00:40:36.079
Twenty miles from Cook, the gang starts work.
00:40:36.320 --> 00:40:40.400
A section of the track is worn and must be taken up and replaced.
00:40:48.239 --> 00:40:56.480
Up they raise heavy sledgehammers, and down, down the hammers fall, ringing out a song of straining backs and sweating arms.
00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:25.840
And at the end of the day, back aboard the quad car and off into the shimmering distance towards Cook and a cool drink.
00:41:49.199 --> 00:41:52.400
It's Sunday morning and time for Sunday school.
00:41:52.639 --> 00:41:56.960
Classes are taken by the two sisters in charge of the small cook hospital.
00:41:57.119 --> 00:42:02.480
Well, we're missionaries here, and the main thing that we're here for is to well, two things.
00:42:02.639 --> 00:42:17.039
Firstly, to look after the sick people and their bodies, and secondly to tell them about Jesus, and uh I think this is probably the uh main reason why we came, knowing that nobody else was here, and that um if we didn't come nobody else would do this work.
00:42:17.360 --> 00:42:19.280
Where had you been working before this?
00:42:19.599 --> 00:42:21.119
I'd been working in Sydney.
00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:22.000
How about you?
00:42:22.239 --> 00:42:23.679
I've been working in Melbourne.
00:42:23.920 --> 00:42:26.079
So you're both very much used to the city way of life.
00:42:26.400 --> 00:42:27.519
Very much so, yes.
00:42:27.840 --> 00:42:30.000
What was it like when you first came out here?
00:42:30.400 --> 00:42:31.519
Very quiet.
00:42:31.920 --> 00:42:40.800
Um the isolation, more than anything else, I think, was what struck us and made us realise just how far out in the back blocks we were.
00:42:40.960 --> 00:42:51.199
But you become very used to it, and when I went back to the city on holidays, I I found myself almost screaming with the noise and and the traffic and and the rest of it.
00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:52.960
There we are.
00:42:55.199 --> 00:42:57.440
Yo, what's the coming track, please?
00:42:57.920 --> 00:43:04.000
The station master arrives for a meeting that's being held in an old weatherboard hall beside the railway track.
00:43:04.159 --> 00:43:12.800
There's no local council in Cook, as you'd find in a normal town, so it's the job of various railway staff members to help run the town.
00:43:13.039 --> 00:43:15.280
And the station master is in charge.
00:43:15.519 --> 00:43:25.199
Well, he uh is responsible for uh the property, the commissioner's property, which is the housing, the halls, the rest houses.
00:43:33.199 --> 00:43:38.400
The tea and sugar train arrives at Cook, and the whole town is out to greet it.
00:43:38.480 --> 00:43:45.360
But while there's a small store in town, the tea and sugar brings the weekly meat supply and also the men's pay.
00:43:45.599 --> 00:43:51.599
I think uh quite a lot of women find it rather unusual to have to clump up onto a train to buy the meat.
00:43:52.239 --> 00:43:53.039
And what about pay?
00:43:53.119 --> 00:43:57.440
I suppose as soon as that train gets in, that everyone in town rushes down there for their pay.
00:43:57.760 --> 00:43:58.960
My very word they do.
00:43:59.199 --> 00:44:00.719
They take a Great event.
00:44:00.800 --> 00:44:13.599
Uh I I think the world over, uh, men working, they look forward to that one day when they're going to reap the benefits of their labor and uh take home the pay packing, and we're certainly no exception at Cook.
00:44:14.400 --> 00:44:25.280
You want me with sweat and strain, but you're licking on right with pain.
00:44:26.880 --> 00:44:31.440
Late into the night, a fetler sings a lonely song to the stars.
00:44:31.760 --> 00:44:38.159
I'm tired of living, I'm skin.
00:44:45.519 --> 00:44:48.480
It can be a hard life, and it's a hot land.
00:44:48.800 --> 00:44:52.639
And some of the men occasionally drink more than they should.
00:44:52.880 --> 00:44:59.280
But woe betide the man in cook who causes any trouble, because the station master will lock him up in no time.
00:44:59.519 --> 00:45:00.639
Right here, in you go.
00:45:00.800 --> 00:45:01.519
In you get.
00:45:02.400 --> 00:45:03.119
Come on.
00:45:03.679 --> 00:45:05.519
We're cooling heels in here tonight.
00:45:08.960 --> 00:45:12.159
That's one jail I certainly wouldn't want to find myself locked in.
00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:17.039
No, it's it's not very well equipped, but it serves the purpose if ever we need to use it.
00:45:17.280 --> 00:45:25.599
I suppose this is uh a duty that uh not many station masters would have to perform in other places that are less isol isolated than Cook.
00:45:25.840 --> 00:45:36.880
No, well other other station masters at other locations have the uh advantage of having a uh uh a state police officer stationed at those particular stations.
00:45:37.280 --> 00:45:40.960
Uh here at Cook we don't have a police officer stationed here.
00:45:41.119 --> 00:45:47.679
Our nearest um arm of the law is at um Tarkula, 250 odd miles from here.
00:45:47.920 --> 00:45:57.280
If anyone gets out of line and it is necessary to uh restrain them, uh these cells are used and uh I'm the gentleman who's got to put them in.
00:45:57.519 --> 00:46:01.840
The station master at Cook is certainly no ordinary station master.
00:46:02.000 --> 00:46:07.039
He's the town's chief official, and if you've got any problems at all, he's the man to see.
00:46:07.199 --> 00:46:11.280
He's the man who wears many caps, the station master on the lonely Nullabor.
00:46:11.519 --> 00:46:16.000
Well, gentlemen, your train will be arriving at uh quarter to uh two.
00:46:27.760 --> 00:46:36.320
An absolutely fascinating aspect of the Transcontinental Railway, along with the tea and sugar train, was the Nullabor piggyback.
00:46:36.480 --> 00:46:51.920
Even when I was going across the Nullabor from 1969 to 1971, close to 400 kilometres of the road across the Nullabor was still unsealed, so unless you drove with great caution, it was treacherous.
00:46:52.159 --> 00:47:07.679
The bulldust that rose in great red plumes was great for signalling that a vehicle was approaching kilometres and kilometres away in the distance, but it also hid under your wheels deep potholes that were more like craters.
00:47:08.559 --> 00:47:12.719
Bad for ordinary vehicles, but a nightmare for truck drivers.
00:47:13.039 --> 00:47:15.119
Hence the Nullabor piggyback.
00:47:15.360 --> 00:47:27.679
Whole trucks and their loads would be driven onto railway flat cars at either end of the Nullabor stretch of the Transcontinental, so in Port Augusta in South Australia or Calgooley in the west.
00:47:27.920 --> 00:47:30.480
The trucks would be lashed down securely.
00:47:30.719 --> 00:47:36.639
Then the truckies would make themselves at home in an old carriage at the back of the train.
00:47:36.960 --> 00:47:40.000
And I do mean make themselves at home.
00:47:40.320 --> 00:47:45.519
Out would come the sausages, the eggs, whatever they wanted to cook, and maybe a beer or two.
00:47:45.679 --> 00:47:53.440
And for the next twenty or so hours they'd relax, playing cards, swap stories, or just spine bash.
00:47:53.599 --> 00:47:54.480
What a life.
00:47:56.559 --> 00:47:57.519
How about this?
00:47:58.000 --> 00:47:59.599
Now we're gonna have that gym.
00:48:02.400 --> 00:48:09.360
When the next season of the Red Dust Tapes podcast begins, I'll bring you the Nullabor Piggyback story.
00:48:09.519 --> 00:48:16.159
As part of my hitching rides with truckies over thousands of kilometres of Highway No.
00:48:20.559 --> 00:48:24.559
Unsealed, dusty, muddy, and rough as hell.
00:48:25.039 --> 00:48:44.239
Meanwhile, thanks to folklorist Warren Fay for his songs, and just as it was with her Aboriginal Stockman story in our earlier chapter on drovers, it was a pleasure to bring you a little from the book by Patsy Adams Smith, Folklore of the Australian Railway Men, unfortunately now out of print.
00:48:45.039 --> 00:48:50.719
Now, don't forget, make sure you check out my website, reddust tapes.au.
00:48:51.599 --> 00:48:56.719
This is John Francis, and Red Dust Tapes saying, hoo roo for now.