the night. A sheep break is constructed by rolling out “ring lock” wire into a half moon shape onto a permanent fence line. Posts are then put into that shape and the wire tightens out as you slowly and evenly use more star pickets to hold this temporary fence in place. You leave about 20 feet or more open at one end where the sheep can come in and then that end is closed up for the sheep to bed down for the night. If you were lucky and had a corner to attach the sheep break to, the job was halved.
Mum and us kids were quite often used as spare dogs to help guide the sheep into the break if the sheep were a bit skittish or if they spread out too far. They had a habit of going around the sheep break rather than in it and there was always a rogue sheep who tried to rush past and would jump over us. I was often knocked over by a galloping sheep but rarely got seriously hurt. It was no use crying to Mum, as she would comfort me with, ‘Go on, have a good cry. The more you cry the less you pee.’
My older sister Emmie was far more motherly or at least showed more sympathy than Mum offered. Sometimes I’d cry behind a tree with self-pity, thinking I was so hard done by.
One day a storm was brewing so it was all hands on deck to get the sheep into the break for the night before the storms hit. Mum and us kids were helping when a sheep broke away from the mob and made a dash for freedom. Dad yelled at Mum to go after it. About an hour later Mum staggered back into the camp, red faced, sweating, panting and obviously furious, with no sheep in sight. Dad made the mistake of asking where the sheep was.
‘I caught the f…ing mongrel and hit it on the head. Next time you run after the f…ing thing yourself,’ she yelled. Mum had chased the sheep for ages and it eventually tangled itself in the fence wire in a panic to get away. Exhausted and seething with anger, Mum then had a long, weary trip back to the camp. By the time she arrived, the rest of the sheep had been penned but the men had not lit a fire or done anything towards starting dinner and this made Mum even angrier. There were six kids and three men still to cook for as well as finishing setting up the camp.
The movie The Ten Commandants came to Narrabri and Mum decided she would take us all to see it to, ‘Get some religion into us.’ Before the movie, we were all lingering outside, possibly for the parents to have a cigarette. Smoking was allowed in cinemas in those days. I thought I was standing by Dad’s legs and felt quite safe looking around at the night lights and things going on in the street. He walked off and I followed before realising none of my siblings were with us. I looked up – this was not my Dad! Horrors, I had been kidnapped! I got such a shock seeing this strange man who was unaware of me trotting beside him. I looked back and saw my family half a block away. Luckily, I had not even been missed, as it would have meant a good hard smack on the bottom for wandering off. The Ten Commandants was a long, exciting movie and was so good I did not fall asleep at all.
Around the same time, The Big Chief, Little Wolf Circus and Buck Jump Riding Show was in town. Dad was half-tanked and he walked up to the Indian sitting in front of the big tent, wearing his feathers and other Indian clothing.
‘You’re not Big Chief Little Wolf,’ Dad said.
The Indian replied, ‘If I’m not Big Chief Little Wolf, I’m having a hell of a good time with his old woman!’
Dad fancied himself as a bit of a rodeo rider and for some reason chose to ride a donkey. His mates hoisted him up onto it and the donkey ambled off slowly. In Dad’s drunken stupor, he fell off landing face first in the hay that was on the floor. One of his mates bent over with laughter pulled him upright again. All the people in there were laughing and Dad proudly straightened up, grabbed his hat off his mate and waved it around to the crowd. He staggered outside with a silly grin on his face ready to face the full wrath of Mum. On the way home, Dad was driving all over the road.
‘Keep on the bloody right side,’ Mum said.
‘Whash shide of the road?’ Dad slurred.
‘Well keep to the bloody centre then,’ she snarled.
‘Where ish the schentre of the road den?’ he replied. It was even scarier when he got to the bridge. From the back of the truck where we were, we could see down into the river bed, water glistening in the moonlight. I was petrified. From the front of the truck we could hear Dad singing a ditty and Mum going ballistic at him. Nothing worse than a drunk when you are sober I guess. We arrived home safely and were delighted when Dad tried to climb into the back of the truck and fell over backwards. He was laughing so much he could not get up so Mum threw a blanket over him and left him there for the rest of the night! She was fed up and gruffly told us to get to bed.
SURAT 1955
Home of the Mandandanji Aboriginal people
We were going into a sheep station called Moolah a few miles west of Surat and fifty miles out of St. George south east Queensland to pick up 3,000 head of Border Leicester sheep to drive them to Nyngan, in north western New South Wales. We found the station entrance, a sagging post that had a rusty tin bucket hanging off it being used for a mail box with the name of the station written across it. The front gates were what the bushies called COD. This meant you could either “carry or drag” them opened and closed. The long lonely dirt track into the station homestead followed the fence line for miles accompanied by a wire for the telephone. The line went from tree to tree and in many places, hung so low, it nearly touched the ground. The whole station was very run down and had a look of desertion about it. To add to the gloominess, the ground was bare of any grass or green herbage of any sort and the small gum trees and bushes looked sad, dry and miserable. Dad took the stock, counting them out of the yards, agreeing with the owner on the amount we now had charge of and signed off on the job.
We eventually arrived at Mungindi, the New South Wales border crossing in that area. The river was high and water was over the stock crossing, which made it impassable for stock, so we had to go over the actual town bridge. This meant taking the stock between the houses on each side of the road to reach the bridge. The sheep did not mind except when a skinny mongrel dog ran from under a house and barked at them. Some sheep got into the house yards that didn’t have fences, nibbling on the lawn or getting into the flower gardens for a quick bite before our dogs chased them out with a whistle from one of the men.
None of us were ever too young to help in any way that we could. Over time, Mum had collected tin lids to make rattles. A hole was made in the middle of the lid and about ten lids were threaded onto a six inch piece of stiff wire that was twisted into a circle. We rattled these to keep the stock moving at a brisk pace. With tins rattling, dogs barking, and people shouting, the town’s people came along to help as it was a novelty to see a large mob of sheep passing through.
The stock was herded to the beginning of the bridge but balked at going onto it. Dad grabbed a sheep and carried it across and it promptly turned around and ran back into the mob. He grabbed another one, tied a dog chain around its neck and carried it part way over the span in view of the other sheep, tying it to the railings. He then came back and shooed some more along. It was hot dusty work, as we were all kept busy moving the 3,000 sheep onto the bridge that didn’t have guide rails on the approach. My brother Col rode his horse across to stop the traffic on the other side where cars had started to bank up. Col had to stand his horse in front of the first car to stop it from edging into the sheep as they came over. As the last of the mob bunched up onto the bridge to cross the Barwon River into New South Wales, Dad lifted me up and put me onto a sheep.
‘Hang on love, ride the bastard over the bridge,’ he said.
Being fully instructed, this was exactly what I did. The ride was rather bumpy as the sheep did not like me on its back. It tried to run between its mates and jump on the ones in front of it but with my little hands clinging on to the wool and my legs firmly dug deep into the sheep’s woolly sides I managed to
