William Murray, Wilcannia News
On Aboriginal week, on Aboriginal march, Colin King used to drive the roller behind the marchers.
The roller was from the Department of main roads. We were putting the bitumen through here then.. He used to get a lend of it off the DMR and bring it in to drive it behind all the marches. A big 80TC roller, 20 tyred roller it was. A big one. 40 tonner. He’d be blowin’ the horn while he drivin’ behind the kids while they were marchin’, everyone.
He had black and yellow paint, it was already orange, an orange roller. He put the other paint on it. That was back in the early 70’s. That was when we were puttin’ in 19 mile.
They was putting the main road through here. Puttin’ bitumen down…goin’ through to Broken Hill. We had a big camp out at 19 mile, a big DMR camp. Used to come in on Wednesdays, get supplies, smokes and a bit of liquor, take it out to the bush with us. Come back in on the Friday, back to town.
19 mile camp, on the Broken Hill road. That was all dirt then. They put the camp out there and that’s where we used to camp and work on the road, the Broken Hill road, putting bitumen on it. Colin King, Fleabag Sutton, what’s here drivin’ round, he was one of us and… lot of ’em not round here now. They all gone. Only me and Fleabag left here what used to work on the DMR those days.
Camp was a big camp. Big kitchen. Little huts in a circle round the big kitchen. 6 gas stoves, 4 burner stoves. Oven underneath where you can cook a roast. Built like this shed over here [the Anglican church shed]. The huts…little one bed…made out of ..like board stuff, plaster board… would’ve been asbestos. They just pull ’em apart and load ’em up and then take ’em, move ’em to the next camp.
When we finished on the Broken Hill road, we went out here and started on the Ivanhoe road then. Set up another camp at the station …30 ks out there….Iva Lewis’s property – Fairmount. We set up camp on their property, on the side of the road.
This article appeared in Wilcannia News, 8 July 2025.
