Subbie wannabe

Reply to hayseed & bruce99.
Coming from Adelaide,I would go through Lithgow and down (very steadily) River Lett Hill.Ring from the 'phone box and an old guy used to come down from the top of Mt.Vic with a Chev (or Ford) blitz wagon and for two quid he'd tow me up to the top. On the return trip from Port Kembla,loaded with coke (not the white stuff),if I was legal I would come up Macquarie Pass and back onto the Hume that way.
One time I was going back to Adelaide and had just gone down Mt.Vic and was slowly climbing up the River Lett hill when the clutch went on the old Commer.I couldn't get out of the cab as the brakes wouldn't hold it.So I'm sitting there with my right foot on the brake and my heel on the accelerator to keep the motor running,and after about 20 minutes my leg started shaking and I had to put both hands on my knee to keep the pressure on.Eventually a car came down the hill from Lithgow and I waved the driver down and said "could you put a chock behind the drive wheel for me?". The guy says "whats a chock"? "I said a bloody great rock & hurry up". Afterwards when I had been towed into Lithgow,it took two of us
to clear the chock off the road as it weighed about 3 cwt!
I guess thats just part of lifes great pageant.
Cheers,Pete

So glad the stories are of interest, this picture is of mate Peter Ritchie, typical of the ex-army vehicles used after the war, Pete Wheatly (wheatbix) aka sailorvee, drove these Federal and Diamomd "t", There were 5 of us as good mates driving in the NT all through the 1950's, Bob Foster and his brother Doug, if we all happened to be in the same town together it was all over!! Bob wrote a couple of books, Wheatbix and I discovered each other on this forum after 50 years of looking so are having a great time going over old times, have been after him to put some on the forum, FINALY! lets hope he keeps going. as mentioned this is where the REAL stories are, so thanfull for this forum, many books written with so much made up to suit the author. Two real ones are Kurt Johannsen and Jack Maddox who tell it like it is. So many have passed away so stories are lost, so some of us who are still here, circling the drain so to speak, should tell them.
Some facts you read like Liz Martin loading cattle at the Camooweal railway station! O'Neils pioneering road transport in the NT, Bill King starting the tourism industry in Central Australia, missinformation goes on and on. What we all did at the time was the norm and guys all over Australia were doing the same thing under difficult Government rules, so we had it a bit easier as the Government dismissed the NT as wasteland so did our own thing, so please all the other old gus out there please contribute your stories, Wheatbix sent two of his albums to the RTHF which they say are "lost" so any help getting them back from anyone would be great>

Ron

Your true stories and pictures have been fantastic to read and watch, keep em comin.

And this is fantastic to read.
Wheatbix and I discovered each other on this forum after 50 years of looking so are having a great time going over old times

I hope Wheatbix and any others that are out there can contribute just as much as you have, dont be shy guys we dont bite much.

Trevor

"Wheatbix sent two of his albums to the RTHF which they say are "lost" so any help getting them back from anyone would be great "

I donated two albums of old truck photos from the 50's to a Transport Temple in Alice Springs overseen by a High Priestess and her acolytes.Another member on this forum made a cunning effort to retrieve them but unfortunately his stunt didn't achieve anything. As Ned was heard to remark "such is life".
Cheers,Pete

The bloke with the Blitz is alive and well, later upgraded to a GMC and then a big Atkinson.

Good to know someone else knows about the Blitz shove!!!
Tell me........... was it a railway sleeper bolted across the front?

Don't know if this will work, havn't tried it before sending script. :

I like your mates tattoo job on his feet, That's a classic Ron.

Ron, does Wheetbix still get around bare feet? You'll have to get him to show us at Beenleigh next weekend.

When Pete's children get married he rents them.