Narrandera’s Easter Rod Run actually originated in a modest kitchen of Narrandera milkman Mal Christie.

In Graham Smith’s fourth edition of his full colour glossy magazine The Australian Hot Rodder, Christie told Smith that it all began on Boxing Day 1970 when Victorian drag racer and show judge John English stopped over in Narrandera with his family on their way to Queensland.

Christie had been a member of the Southern Hot Rod Club and had built a number of hot rods and regularly raced them at drags at Pakenham and later Fishermans Ben and Calder.

Sitting in Christie’s home the two hot rodders started talking about hot rodding and its future. Christie had read about the national rod runs happening in America and thought something similar could be done in Australia.

He said Narrandera was the perfect venue because it was central location at the junction of the Newell and Sturt Highways. English agreed and they settled on a plan to approach the Australian Hot Rod Street Federation, the predecessor of today’s Australian Street Rod Federation, with the proposal to hold a national rod run in Narrandera.

At the same time English was pitching the idea to the AHRF, Christie was selling the idea to the local community in Narrandera, where he was already a known hot rodder with a flathead-powered 1934 Ford Roadster.

The first person he called on was the late Dan Clarke, the local tourist officer at the time and a former Narrandera Argus journalist, who enthusiastically supported the idea.

Having won Dan’s support, the two of them went to the Narrandera Shire Clerk at the time Dick Goss who threw his support behind the idea and the Narrandera Street Rod Committee was born.

The Narrandera Council, the Narrandera Argus and local MP the late Tim Fischer also came on board.

Christie recalled said that while the local council and business community supported it, Dick Goss said the local community was apprehensive, thinking it might be an invasion of rev-heads, but he was soon proved wrong.

AHRF Victorian State director Trevor Edmunds’ resignation in mid-1972 just six months before the Nationals thrust Bob Dykes into the position. It was a scary situation, said Christie, as he had never done anything like it before.

Christie was hard at work promoting the show in Narrandera while Dykes and his crew were busy behind the scenes ensuring all was ready for the weekend.

To help Christie, Sydney hot rodder Phil Buchanan brought his wild Model T Ford, the Tilted Tee, to Narrandera and displayed it at the local Ford dealership for five weeks leading up to the run.

At Easter 1973 Narrandera became ‘Hot Rod Heaven’ with rods and hot rodders everywhere – they were parked up and down the main street and seen filling up at service stations, registering for the event at the showground and cruising the streets soaking up the atmosphere.

As Christie predicted, the 234 rods registered came from all over the country, including New Zealand.

A Go-Whoa was staged in a side street, there was a streetkhana on grass at the Sportsground, a blindfolded slalom in which the driver was blindfolded and a passenger directed them on a run to Griffith.

It wasn’t just the rodders who enjoyed themselves, but the locals who came in their droves from all around the region. The Narrandera Argus reported a crowd of 3000 to 4000 people.

Narrandera had barely caught its breath than planning began for the second Nationals in 1975. However, some issues within the AHRF at the time had serious ramifications for the future of hot rodding and needed to be resolved.

The result was that drag racing and the show and street activities would each go in their own directions. Drag racers formed the Australian National Drag Racing Association and on October 1, 1973 the show and street guys reformed under the banner of the Australian Street Rod Federation.

Word had spread about the Nationals and in 1975 a total of 417 rods were registered and local people drove up to 200 kms each day to be part of the fun, some doing it every day because they couldn’t find accommodation in the town. It was estimated 10,000 people packed into the showgrounds for the car show and the crowd watching the Go-Whoa was five and six deep.

Graham Smith wrote there was already talk the 1977 Nationals could be the last event held at Narrandera before the rodders arrived for the event. Narrandera Shire Clark, the late Dick Goss was confident it would continue but he warned locals it depended heavily on the success of the 1977 event.

Among ASRF officials there was also concern that the event had outgrown the town’s capacity to accommodate it.

More than 1000 hot rods rolled into Narrandera for the 1977 Nationals and every bit of accommodation was taken up by rodders who packed out motels, hotels, camping grounds, the showground and anywhere else they could pitch a tent.

Costs of staging the Nationals had grown to the point that its future was threatened and Bob Dykes and his committee then decided larger corporate sponsors were needed to secure the event. That meant moving to a new, larger location.

While Narrandera remained in contention it became increasingly clear that the Nationals had outgrown the town and in 1979 they moved to Albury.

The Earlies Rod Run now replaces that event and is now a showpiece event for Narrandera.

This article appeared in the Narrandera Argus, 28 March 2024.