Mail for the Back of Beyond

This is the story of the motor truck pioneers who contributed as much to Australia's transport history as the mail coaches, riverboats and railways. Unlike the romance associated with the mail runs of Cobb & Co., the task of the early mail truck drivers in outback areas was lonely and monotonous, at times dangerous. Making a clutch plate from the base of a 44-gallon drum in the desert ... trapped in mud bogs for nearly a fortnight ... digging trucks out of sand drifts in 50C̊ heat ... twenty-four hours huddled in a truck cab waiting for sand and dust storms to abate ... unloading freight and mail into boats to cross flooded rivers ... charging over sandhills after getting up speed by racing across a claypan ... these and other experiences were shrugged off by the early mail drivers as 'just part of the job'.