looking for info 1960' sydney to north paper deliveries

M

misterchugg

Active member
hi all while i cant work on my route due to still having the shakes in my hand, i thought i would ask this. how were the newspapers in the 1960's delivered from Sydney to the north. like Newcastle, Murwillumbah, Casino. etc one chap i was talking to in hospital reckons they were delivered by trucks that left Sydney just after lunch can anybody clear any of this up? thanks ron
 
I may be wrong but i think they were delivered on the mail trains that left Sydney at night, as these trains ran all over the country areas, to deliver the mail which alot of the time was sorted on the train as it went along, i remember seeing them leave Sydney terminal at night and i also traveled on some of them before their demise.
 
Petan said:
Sydney Morning Herald Flying Service operated for a while. More http://www.adastron.com/lockheed/hudson/heraldfs.htm
Click to expand...

My earlier gave material for longer distance places as listed at the above URL For shorter distances rail was used, later to road and air.

Groups of us also came up to the Trocadero [a dance hall aka 1950s night club, for the younger folk] on Saturday nights & thought it was great to get "The Paper Train" home. It left Sydney at 12.15am stopping at every station between Sydney & Wollongong to leave the daily Newspapers at the stations.
from http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/AUS-NSW-SYDNEY/2002-03/1017184610

Following from the Train Composition & Marshalling Book 26th October 1958 copied from the Microsoft Train website.
http://shortnorth.steam4me.net/files/NSWGR General Passenger Traffic Workings.pdf

The ‘Paper Train’ – No 19 -
Down No19 dep Sydney 1:15am – arr Newcastle 5:45am
Up No84 dep Newcastle 6:30am – arr Sydney 11:00am
Locos – R32 – P38, P35
Cars – Down - (Tue, Wed, Fri) LFX, LFX, BX, VHO, EHO – (Mon, Thu) - FO, FO, BI, BI, FO,
FO, BS (Mon), VHO, EHO (Thu)
Up - (Mon, Tue) FO, FO, FO, BI, BI, FO, FO, FO, EHO, LFX – (Wed, Thu, Fri) - FO, FO, FO,
BI, BI, FO, FO, FO, LFX, EHO

Very similar at http://www.coalstonewcastle.com.au/route/

I understand very similar for all routes out of Sydney, as well as just about every part of Australia.

Then we had the era when the Sydney papers for QLD were printed in Sydney and airfreighted to places such as Ballina and Coolangatta using smaller planes. The same plane could well have dropped off loads along the coast in a similar manner to the overnight air freight and courier planes which could be anything from a 30 seater to a 19 seater metro to 10 seater or smaller.

My understanding is that now the Sydney papers for QLD and northern NSW are printed in Brisbane and trucked south to northern NSW.
Click to expand...
 
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railventure said:
I may be wrong but i think they were delivered on the mail trains that left Sydney at night, as these trains ran all over the country areas, to deliver the mail which alot of the time was sorted on the train as it went along, i remember seeing them leave Sydney terminal at night and i also traveled on some of them before their demise.
Click to expand...

Certainly I have read similar in rail magazines as well as, like Railventure, watching bundles of newspapers being loaded into the vans at Sydney's Central Station.

I think the final answer for Ron is a combination of the mail trains, the paper trains and aircraft. The numerous morning East West or Airlines of NSW / Ansett Fokker F.27 Friendships could arrive at a country town with a later edition of the newspaper, compared to the edition printed when the train left Sydney. Airfreight was always extra cost, of course, in those days.
 
misterchugg said:
thanks for the info. the http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.co...-03/1017184610 doesn't get through. it keeps telling me that it timed out. if somebody has that, could you please email it to me. thanks again for all the info Ron
Click to expand...

Ron, don't worry too much about that site as I had copied the "paper train" bit in my previous post. Just for the sake of completeness, below is a full quote from the 10 year old material [posted to Internet 27 Mar 2002] which also mentions sleeping in the luggage racks above the seats.

Cheers
Peter

...From: "Heartseas" <heartseas@optusnet.com.au> [SIZE=+1]Subject: Re: [ANS] THE BEACHES.
Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2002 10:17:43 +1100
References: <00ab01c1d4b9$b39af600$418c8ec6@ellerton>[/SIZE]

The beaches were beautiful and in the late 40's we used to travel up from Wollongong on the week-ends to attend Beach Carnivals. Bondi was my
favourite. My boy friend (later husband ) was a lifesaver. There were no needles or anything like that on the beaches in those days.
Groups of us also came up to the Trocadero on Saturday nights & thought it was great to get "The Paper Train" home. It left Sydney at 12.15am stopping at every station between Sydney & Wollongong to leave the daily Newspapers at the stations . We used to take rugs to cover us, Book them in at the Cloak room at Central Station to be picked up on the way home, & lay along the seats in the old trains & sleep.. If the trains were crowded some of the boys would sleep in the luggage racks above the seats. It was all such innocent fun. No one was ever assaulted or Molested.

By the way whilst on this trip down memory lane there is something I have been trying to remember for years. My husband once took me to have lunch at a lovely restaurant somewhere down near the Quay or Martin Place or thereabouts. You went downstairs to dine & there were musicians roaming around throughout the restaurant & I could see an outdoor garden through glass doors.Can anyone tell me where this place was & it's name please? My husband has been dead for years so I can't ask him.
Regards
Marie
 
misterchugg said:
hi all while i cant work on my route due to still having the shakes in my hand, i thought i would ask this. how were the newspapers in the 1960's delivered from Sydney to the north. like Newcastle, Murwillumbah, Casino. etc one chap i was talking to in hospital reckons they were delivered by trucks that left Sydney just after lunch can anybody clear any of this up? thanks ron
Click to expand...

Ron, just had a rethink and noticed you wrote "left Sydney just after lunch". Clearly I have been previously answering the wrong question as I was referring to the papers that normally appear on our lawns before breakfast. I am not sure the papers that arrived in the mornings would be ready for dispatch to leave Sydney just after lunch.

As Railventure said,they were delivered on the mail trains that left Sydney at night. My memory says similar to Railventure, not mid arvo.

Maybe the hospital mate was referring to the afternoon papers?

So, is it safe to assume the arvo papers that were sold on Sydney city street corners as people went home from work, were also delivered to country areas as well so they may have gone in the guards vans on trains such as the commuters to Moss Vale, Wollongong, Katoomba etc????

Interesting puzzle?

Cheers
Peter
 
hi peter

nope, he definitely said they went to the far north.
he caught a lift on one of the trucks one day and helped throw the bundles off at the bigger towns when they stopped there.

all i can think of is that maybe the year is wrong???

cant ask him, cause he ain't in there no more and i got no address for him.
staff told me they weren't allowed to give out private info.

were there any newspaper delivered to the previously mentioned towns at any time?

thanks
ron
 
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