Almanac Life: 3 for ’61 – West Indies in Sydney

May 12, 2026 by Pestwac 1 Comment

3 for ’61 – West Indies in Sydney.

Growing up, most years, we went towards the Coast on holidays. Dad had three breaks during the year, a week at Easter when he went to his Army mates somewhere, or they came to us some times, at planting when he worked day and night on a tractor for someone who needed a hand, often again Army blokes who were crook, and for a week at Christmas when he parked the car at Tamworth or Muswellbrook or Dubbo or Queanbeyan after driving for a day then we caught the train for another day to reach our destination.

Once when we had a Dodge, it looked like a big FJ, Dad and three of us went in this to Ebor the first day, then over the range to Urunga on the coast, to a man and his car which had boiled and broke. Then we towed him and his car, his wife and kids, back up and over the Great Dividing Range to Armidale, where they worked on the car, his and ours now, and got everything going and then we went home, stopping at swimming pools on the way, pools and pubs really. What a week. We camped but not how you would expect, in the car, and ate Devon and raw vegetables and drank fruit juice. We swam in the clothes you wanted washed, in some creek or river though then changed into your togs, as normal, and everything dried in the breeze as we went along.

It was a train ride at Christmas, that was the start for Dad, me too, not Mum so much, and more than once she flew to us a day or so later. Those other kids did their thing at home, who cared?

Several times we stayed with John and Glennie, my Aunt and her new husband.

John was a technician with the Trams in Sydney. He caught a bus, a bus, a train and a bus to work on the Trams at a depot that was in the process of closing down, and as was the entire Tram business network. His work vehicle was a tram, a big brown one, when most were green, and his tram had a trailer permanently attached, so two trams. You could drive it from either end. It was more a tow truck, (tram tow truck) that moved immovable trams out of the way, to some place to have them repaired, by John, or replaced by another tram. They were the same size but were heavier, there was a weight mass down the centre of each. There were lots of spares, dozens of trams, waiting. He had a regular looking truck too, an 8 tonner Austin, that he used to move trams when there was no electricity overhead. Lots of route miles were being de-commissioned at that time, the rails remained but the overhead wires came off, quickly. It had a roo bar, in downtown Sydney!

Dad and I spent a day with him, starting in the workshop with a cup of tea and a biscuit then straight away out on the ‘lines’ to move a tram which had refused to go. We were followed by another tram to take the immovable one’s place, if John couldn’t get it to move. He didn’t try, he saw or reckoned a major motor problem from the smell, and the replacement tram took over the route. Just like that.

We hooked onto the broken vehicle and moved back through the lines to the depot where it was moved ‘out the back’ for assessment and storage now. John continued with his work while Dad and I caught a tram , as you do, into the city and he went to his work HQ and I went to a sports store, nearby, a big store, three floors of it. A man offered to sell me a racing bicycle, it was several hundred pounds and he told me to ask my Grandparents for it, everybody does. There were many variations of cricket bats, normal and wide and fat it seems. My Aunt, not Glennie, buys my football kit every year there. I select then tell them to ring her and she says yes to the cost over the telephone. Normally Mum does this on the phone from home too, for me.

We went back to John after lunch at Dad’s Hq cafeteria. So many handshakes, goodness.

John told us he had to go to the SCG line to inspect and remove a tram that had an accident while reversing and another who had refused to go forward while waiting for the first at the accident scene. The tram tow truck we used had a caravan body with table and chairs, benches, electric saws and hydraulic presses and jacks. The second, trailing tram, had the caravan body and shelves of boxes containing things a tram fixer might need, somehow, some time, and proper seats for staff, 12, to travel on. Two trams go to recovery scenes as the weight of two assists in the braking effect of moving three trams back to the depot. There is a telephone in the driving tram that links to a plug hole at various locations and a movement plan is decided upon and stuck to with the organizers in the operations office.

There was a cricket test at the Sydney Cricket Ground. I could see the buildings there from where the busted tram was and Dad and I walked there and went into the ground, for free I was told. Cricket was way out in the middle, little men in white clothes, running. The real entertainment was in the crowd, it was noisy, I mean it was alive and responsive to things happening way over in the centre and when the ball came out to where we were there was name calling done. One, Mr Hall, was on the boundary line near us for a few minutes, it was nearly quiet then. He is big, and smiled at us. He bowled later, you could see the ball bounce off the wicket near the batsman then, the keeper move or sometimes, the third man moved over to field. (Perhaps I’m spoilt by cricket on tv now, instant replays and all)

I walked around the ground and saw the broadcast area. At least now I could associate where the voices came from. There was a crowd watching players in the nets, bowlers and bats man getting ready, maybe. It seemed to be a bit of an industry, everybody in white, most serious. I didn’t have food, I didn’t have enough money. I drank from the bubbler, that’ll do me. The place was electric I felt, there was an instant response to what was happening in the middle. There was a big number of kids there too, girls and boys, watching and cheering. Most everybody was involved, not placid watching, but sitting and standing in response to what was happening in the centre. Noisy, good.

We went back to John and the trams and he was going to tow it back to the storage yard at the Depot. He had to crank up an axle off the rails as it was not turning, then he had to take that tram away down the line to a corner, make a call to get the next few streets switched to allow him, and the trams, to proceed and eventually we arrived back at our trailer with the damaged tram on the end of the train of 3, a good thing. Off we went back to the depot with two stops for telephone calls to arrange progress over the ‘lines’.

Working trams use the radio, not the repair crew who have to organize sections to be opened to them to move towards their destination. Members of the public , Dad and me now, are not allowed on or near a recovered tram, rules you know, but he got permission for us, and off we went. It is something about unsecured electricity sometimes, and flanged wheels in the tow trams, kind of made sense, the busted tram was not hooked up overhead, so no power, and one set of axles, near us in the trailer wasn’t turning anyway. Dad said shoosh.

Next day was a rest day at the cricket. Dad had Army, Legacy, business. I went to the zoo, a ferry ride and we raced a ‘Queen’ along the harbour, to Manly for a swim, then a bus back to where we were staying. Mum and John went to collect Dad and everybody went to a Club for tea. Next day, Dad went to the cricket again and Mum and I went into Sydney city for the shops. Mum had been doing a sewing course for a couple of days and wanted needles. We bought those and lots of things else.

Dad came home and announced we were all going to the cricket for ‘the week’ next time a test was played there. He said somewhere though. Mum coughed and said ‘you go, you two, I’ll be busy, guaranteed’.

It didn’t happen.

I hadn’t had an interest in cricket up until then. I had not played in an organized game. I hit balls in the nets, and bowled there too, but the thought of standing in a paddock on a hot day hadn’t appealed to me. Sorry. It couldn’t happen anyway. There was no cricket in town, no team, although there had been an enthusiastic group some years previously and a honour board for the cricket team ‘Player of the Year’ but 16 years before. Footballers, of which there were plenty, may not naturally progress to cricket as a summer sport, surely they do play at something but how that came about in that town at that time I don’t know. Water Polo was big, tennis, cycling, shooting. Then in the last two years I was there in town the cricket club got energized again. School teachers and mine workers made a committee and water for the oval came from the new sewage plant and suddenly at winters end there was a green oval, complete with kangaroos and emus, and a strip of concrete in the middle which was covered in weaved cloth when they practiced on it. I still didn’t play cricket.