Shane O’Shea, The Buloke Times.
After a long and very enjoyable fifty-one-and-a-half-year association with the “Buloke Times” (formerly the “Donald Times” and “Donald-Birchip Times”), I have made the difficult decision to retire, which came into effect as of June 30.
I first joined the staff of the then “Donald Times” as a 16 -year-old, after completing Form 4 at Donald High School.
The late Goff Letts Snr. was editor, Robin Letts the chief reporter, the late Ron Garrett and Brian Bayles formed the production team, and the late Allan Dunstan operated the front office.
The newspaper approached the school, seeking an apprentice, and my name was suggested.
After working after school in the latter part of 1971, to gain a better understanding of what my new employment opportunity might entail, I signed my indentures as a Hand and Machine Compositor, and started full time work in January, 1972.
Over the next four years, I undertook block releases of two weeks each, four times a year, to attend the Melbourne College of Printing and Graphic Arts, in North Melbourne, to complement my on-the-job training.
Back then all printing at the “Times” was done by the letterpress method, printing from a raised surface, during which ink was transferred to the printing surface by rollers, and through the use of another set of rollers, the image was transferred from the tyre onto paper.
On January 9, 1973, the “Donald Times” and “Birchip Guardian” combined to form the “Donald-Birchip Times”, with Janet Lee and Hazel McCready joining the team.
The advent of offset printing and the arrival of the computer age, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, transformed the printing industry, and my job as a hand and machine compositor and many others in the printing trade, changed forever.
Up until the end of 1981, the newspaper had been produced using the letterpress printing process, which entailed preparing material by setting the text for news items using Linotype and Intertype hot metal machines to create lead slugs, mounting scanned photographs on wooden blocks that had to be the same height as the type on the lead slugs (type high), and making up advertising, often using handset wooden and metal type and spacing, to ensure than when all the elements were combined in a page, locked up in a steel chase (a metal frame) using printer’s quoins (a metal wedge that expanded or contracted when manipulated with a quoin key), everything remained in place when the chase was lifted and transferred by hand to the printing press.
Once each edition had been printed and distributed, the pages had to be dismantled, handset type returned to the type storage cases, often two cases of the same font and type size positioned one above the other on a framework, for ease of access. These cases were referred to as the top or upper case for capital letters, and bottom or lower case for lower case letters.
The lead slugs used in the production of each edition, if not needed again, had to be melted down and poured into moulds to form ingots suitable to be fed back into the pots on the typesetting machines. The process was continued, twice a week, week after week, for 48 weeks a year (the “Times” traditionally took time off over the Christmas/New Year period, and missed one edition at Easter time.
In the late 1970s, type setting machines, a forerunner to computers, began to change the nature of newspaper production, with the machines producing long screeds of text, including headings in a variety of type styles, that could be cut and pasted into position on a newspaper page. For a number of years, this process was employed to produce the “Times”.
“Moving with the Times” was never more relevant for the newspaper, which at the start of 1982, made the transition from letterpress to offset printing (a process that involves ink being transferred by rollers on to a metal plate, with the ink adhering to the areas that are to be printed, whilst being repelled by areas that are not to be printed, and is then transferred on to the surface of the paper during impression), requiring the retraining of those involved in the type setting and printing processes.
Computer Age
Around that time, Donald High School teacher, Ron Corrie, suggested that desktop publishing might be the way to go, with the advent and rapid development of computers transforming the way printed material could be produced.
The move involved introducing a fully computerised system, using offset printing, which had many advantages over letterpress, including being much faster, cleaner, neater and healthier (it no longer involves the handling of lead).
It also transformed the important photography section of newspaper production. Digital cameras preplaced the old Pentax cameras that we had previously been using. There was a huge time saving, with a photograph able to be taken, downloaded onto a computer and placed into position on the Quark layout page (computer software used by the “Times) within minutes. There was no longer the lengthy darkroom process of unloading film from the Pentax, developing the negative and processing each photograph individually, and then having to produce another image suitable for use in the newspaper.
The entire newspaper production has been transformed by the digital age: Correspondents and other contributors can now send in the text of news items and accompanying photographs, which can be downloaded and copied and pasted on to a page and prepared for passing on to the editor and sub-editor.
During my time at the “Times”, I have worked with some remarkable people, from my first editor, Goff Letts Snr., current editor Robin Letts and his wife Shirley, brothers Goff and Ewan Letts, Allan Dunstan and Lesley Dunstan, Brian Bayles, Ron Garrett, Janet Lee and Hazel McCready, and Lil Kirk, from whom I learnt so much and received unmatched encouragement to take on and develop new skills.
I have also been very fortunate to work with my business partner, David Letts, and a large number of staff members, Jim Neish, Simon Brasche, Owen Wood, Anne-Maree Smith, Matt Arnel, Brian Beckham, Aaron Grant, Betty Coats, Kim Prebble, former front office staff Rosie Noonan, Maria Grayling and Maree Sands, Simone Christie in Birchip, Jenny Pollard in Charlton, and the many regular contributors, including racing reporter, Peter Hibberd.
And then there are the current members of the “Times” production room family, Patsy Dunstan (front office), Carmen Bath, Candece Jay, Quill McQuilty and the latest recruit, Alyssa Walker. Life is never dull when these ladies are around.
Over recent months, I have tried to impart some of the knowledge gleaned over many years on to these very capable ladies, whom, I have no doubt, can continue working with Robin and David to produce a newspaper of which we can all be proud.
Sports Writing
Opportunities to develop new skills often presented themselves during my early years at the “Times”, including adding sports reporting and photography as other “strings to my bow” (according to the editor).
My introduction to writing was covering Donald reserves games under the pen name of “One of ’em” (because I was also trying to get a game in the team at the time). With the encouragement of Robin, who helped develop my writing skills, and Shirley Letts, who passed on her photography expertise, I eventually graduated to covering senior football and other sporting events, as well as general news reporting, which were among of the most enjoyable aspects of working at the “Times”.
Producing the newspaper twice a week has always been one of my most significant duties, and making the transition from letterpress and hot metal machines to offset and computers has been both challenging and rewarding.
The demands of publication day, every Monday and Thursday, have been a constant source of stress, and has meant having to work on Saturday and Sunday most weekends, but the reward has been seeing the newspaper hit the street every Tuesday and Friday.
After 51 and a half years, however, the enthusiasm for working 7 days a week has worn thin, influencing my decision to retire.
North-Central “Recorder”
From my earliest days at the “Times”, I have been involved in the production of the North-Central Football League’s “Recorder”, the weekly publication during each football season, that includes team lists and club reports.
It is now more than just a football booklet, and also features a coverage of North-Central netball and hockey. I can attribute that expanded coverage to the late Mrs Barb Melican, who said to me on several occasions, “Why aren’t you including more coverage on netball in the ‘Recorder’?”
In 2019, the league decided to upgrade the grand final edition, both in size and content, and it has been a great sense of satisfaction to see the finished product that we have produced from our offices at 6 McCulloch Street.
Chamber of Commerce and Industry
As part of my duties with the “Times”, I joined the Don- ald Chamber of Commerce and Industry in 1985, when journalist Owen Wood left to pursue other interests.
I had the good fortune to work with some wonderful local business owners, including Harold Strickland, Leanne Onley, John Lenaghan, Leigh and Joan Hardingham, Sandra and Graeme Harris, Kerry Duncan, Stacey Morris and Nicole Nunn, to mention a few, with the highlight of each year being organising the annual Christmas Shopping Promotion.
Outside Interests
Not a gifted footballer but a lover of the game, I found my niche in the sport as an a ministrator, first with the Donald Football Club, as treasurer of its ladies’ committee in the late 1970s, and then club secretary from 1980 to 1983.
The opportunity to step up to the position of North-Central League treasurer presented itself in 1984, and when the secretary of the time, Mark Letts, moved to the Northern Territory in 1985, I was promoted to replace him, carrying out the duties for four years, from 1986 to 1989.
Mixed Media
In addition to my football writing on behalf of the “Times”, I have also been involved in the league’s weekly radio segments for many years, taking over from Robin Letts in 1985 on the 3WM Station, announcing teams each Thursday evening. One of the station’s broadcasters was Dan Lonergan, who went on to bigger and better things in the metropolitan media.
When that station gave North-Central the flick prior to the start of the 1993 season, Swan Hill-based 3SH, and the guru of local radio at that time, Harold Pratt, took on the league, an association now in its 31st. year, and currently hosted by Noel Watson, every Saturday morning, at around 9.20 a.m..
Apart from local press, North-Central winter sport and the achievements of its footballers, netballers and hockey players, don’t get the media coverage they deserved, and that’s one of the main reasons I have continued in the role.
Career Highlights
Over the span of 51 years, there have been many news worthy events covered by the “Times”. For me the ones that stick in my memory include the floods of 1974 and 2011, the mass gathering of duck hunters around Lake Buloke in 1974, the “Donald-Birchip Times’s” Centenary celebrations in 1975; the Russell Street Bombing in 1986, with the perpetrators, Stanley Taylor, Craig and Rodney Minogue, planning their deadly blast whilst living in Birchip; Birchip’s Centenary celebrations, Donald’s 150th. celebrations in 2013.
Helping to establish an online presence for the “Buloke Times” with the launch of the newspaper’s digital version in 2020 has also been a great source of satisfaction.
Photos courtesy Shane O’Shea and The Buloke Times.
This article appeared in The Buloke Times, 11 July 2023.
