The Countryman part 2 - Retrofuture edition

Part 1 is here.

Let's start off with my new favourite-ever article:

CATTLE. HOVERCRAFT. CATTLEHOVERCRAFT. 

In 1961, rural Western Australia was just a few years away from replacing a bunch of cattle trucks with HOVERCRAFT. This is about the most retro-futuristic thing you could do to livestock farming without putting it on the moon. 

I imagine the trials for this would have been awkward when they realised the ground tends to have a lot of inconveniently-placed rocks and trees. 

I draw your attention to the byline for this article: In 1961, the government was asking farmers to volunteer up a portion of their crops to support the 1962 Perth Commonwealth Games. Just 50 years ago farmers were expected to support the government rather than the government bailing out farmers.

These last three need no commentary, they're just some ads you probably don't see too often.

The Countryman, November 9th 1961

I was visiting the parents recently, and found a copy of The Countryman from November 9th, 1961 lying around. For those who don't know, The Countryman is a rural paper from Western Australia.

I'll post the fun entries later, but first this.

Transcript Below, you don't have to read all that tiny writing.

Some context:

•  Aboriginals didn't get the vote until 1967, a good six years after this. 
• A pickaninny is a black child
• Pollard is apparently just bran with a bit of flour. 
• There are other contemporary reports covering the same material, which agree on the main facts.
• A gallon is some archaic measure of liquids, equal to about 4.5 litres

I'm not really sure what to make of it. The whole structure and tone of this article just confuses me.

Either way, the article itself is more interesting than my rambling so here's a transcript.

Native outlaws terrorised East Kimberley in 1907
by Doug Moore

At the Red Butte on Texas Downs station one night the stockmen were watching cattle held in an old yard - this was a necessity when the yards were old as the wire could easily be broken.

After doing a spell on watch, the native, Major, came into the camp, but was ordered to do another watch by the man in charge, Kelly. Major Resented it and cleared out with two other natives.

This incident, in 1907, started the three natives on a brief career of murder amid the wild ranges of East Kimberley when this region was real "frontier land".

The natives took two rifles and ammunition, and picking up their gins at Texas station they went up the Osmond-River to Growlers Gully where a bushman known as Scotty had his camp. 
There they stole half a bag of flour and camped near Mt. John.

When Scotty returned to his camp he noticed that the flour was missing and saw the native tracks. He put strychnine in the remaining bag of flour, left it in the same place, and went away again.

But Major was not to be caught as easily as that. Later, from his tracks, it was discovered that he had looked through the flour and had found the poison in it. He and his two companions then waited close by and when Scotty returned they shot him dead. They took more firearms and ammunition and escaped back into the ranges.

The next we heard of them they were on Black Gin Creek off Moonlight Valley where they murdered two white men named Jordie and Kettle.

After this every stock rider and prospector went about full-armed and on the lookout for the murderers. The country was in a state of alarm.

All the mustering camps kept a careful watch at night and took no chances. At mistake Creek when the cook was on watch one night he woke up Tom Cole to tell him there was a black object near the campfire which was some distance away. Tom snatched up his rifle and fired two shots at it, but on investigation it turned out to be the beef bucket, and it had two holes in it. That was good shooting.

By this time the mounted police from Wyndham, Turkey Creek and Halls Creek were on the outlaws' tracks and kept them moving.

While the natives stayed in the Carr Boyd Range they had good cover but were short of tucker. One of their pickaninnies was found half-eaten at a campfire about the Osborne cattle camp. Mick Nevlin who was camped there at the time showed me the remains.

Some time afterwards they left the range and made over to Mistake Creek. I was at the Fourteen Mile camp one night when they stole my rifle from alongside my mosquito net in which I was sleeping.

A few days later the three boys - Major, Nipper and Dibby were surrounded by the police at the Nine-Mile Hill. They put up a big fight, and the hills echoed to the crash of rifle fire, but they were eventually all shot.

The policy recovered my rifle and it is now in the police museum in Perth. Some years ago I tried to get it back, but because I was unable to give its number they refused to let me have it. 

Two years before this episode my mate and I had camped near the Wild Dog police station on our way to Ord River station with thirty heavily-loaded pack mules.

The police outpost was between the Behn-river and the Negri and consisted of a tin shanty with a few tent flys and a bough shed- also a couple of big trees to chain native prisoners to, as was the custom then.

The station was manned by two mounted constables, McKenna and Thompson (who was later murdered by natives with George Shoesmith on the Canning Track), and after fixing up camp we strolled over to see the police noticing at the same time that they had about 15 natives chained around a tree. The natives were to be taken into Wyndham to be tried for cattle killing.

That night they kept up a big corroboree, singing and tapping but when daylight came it was discovered that there were only six old gins singing and tapping sticks. The bucks had chopped their chains during the night and had all cleared out into the ranges.

You can imagine the uproar at the station. But those troopers were equal to such things; and by riding hard and fast, and by good tracking on the part of their boys; all the escapees were eventually rounded up at the Fourteen-Mile junction of the Ord River, and eventually taken to Wyndham. 

About this time another constable was also bringing a big mob of natives into Wyndham, charged with cattle killing. He was being paid so much a head to feed them on the way down - a walk of 250 miles in dog-chains in single file behind the constables horse.

After careful consideration, he decided to feed them on pollard and water. None of them could speak English, all were naked, and this diet soon extended their stomachs.

After every feed he used to smack his own stomach and say "Good fella tucker" until they all did the same and could repeat this.

In court at Wyndham, the old Magistrate looked at them and said, sure enough, "Good fella tucker?" The natives all clapped their hands to their bulging stomachs and chorused "Good fella tucker." The magistrate was satisfied, much to the constables delight.

Another incident I can recall was a spearing affray at Ord River station one night in 1907 between the Turner-river and Ord-River natives. 

An Afghan camel team had arrived at the station with a big load from Wyndham. They had with them a  Turner River native. One night the Turner river native was caught stealing in the station camp and was followed and speared by Big Tommy and the Ord Boy.

The incident was forgotten until a week later when one night there was a terrible row in the camp. Gins came running up to the homestead in the dark singing out "Blackfellow bin spear 'em boy all about. Come Quick."

Going down with a hurricane lamp I saw four natives stretched out with spears through their bodies. 

The Turner River natives had avenged the death of their tribesman.

Broken Things: iPhone 4

I was browsing through some older files when I saw this pic. The story behind this phone is one of adventure, intrigue, and criminal elements leaving their murky underworld to terrorise the public.

This iPhone has a fun little escapade attached to it, in April this year.

The Owner had it stolen while picking their kids up from school - they left the car unlocked for two minutes, and came back to find it gone. By sheer luck he'd recently been travelling so we'd connected his brand-new phone to our corporate mobileme account.

 He called me about an hour later and I pulled it up on 'find my iphone'. We got occasional reports as it was driven south before the thief finally settled down for the evening at a little house in Fremantle.

I kept an eye on it the next morning, and finally got a good GPS reading that showed exactly which house it was in.  One screenshot and we were in business.

We got lucky again when we got the police involved. They apparently had some free time (and were intrigued by 'Find My iPhone'), so they sent a car around to the house. They found one elderly man and his son in a near-empty house who let the officers in for a quick look around their mostly empty house. There was no sign of any phone and the police left. It looked like our investigation had come to an inglorious end.

The next day, we got some surprising news: The phone had been turned in at the Fremantle police station looking rather damaged (see above). The man who turned it in said they'd just found it but - rather conveniently - happened to live at the same house the police had visited the day before. It seems the police visit unsettled him, so he did the logical thing: Hit the phone repeatedly with a rock, and turn it in denying all knowledge.


Where are they now?

The Mysterious Thief: I lost all involvement with the case after we got the phone back, but he was in the awkward position of explaining why the phone had been in his house and turned on for two nights before he 'found it'. I hope it went well for him.

The iPhone: One $80 screen replacement put it in perfect working condition, and it's still chugging along just fine.

Perth Verge Collection Map

Update:
This map is now very out of date, last updated 2014. Thankfully, a new champion has taken up the challenge and the current map can be found at vergeside.com.au

 






Original post:
I've been fiddling with this for a while, so it's time to share: A google maps layer that shows the Vergeside rubbish collection areas for the whole Perth metropolitan area. This is pretty useful to anyone around Perth who're looking for some free furniture or appliances, as well as to those just wondering when their next vergeside collection is.

I'll update this post with relevant data as it changes.

How it works and notes: 

• Click here to get to the full version of the map. It's easier to work with than the embedded version below.
• On the left you have the various collection zones/councils with the next known collection date. Flick through the pages to see the rest of the zones, as google maps won't display them all at once by default.
• The date represents when the collection itself starts, not when to start putting things out.
• You can save this map directly in your google profile by hitting the save to my places button.
• You can export the map data as KML if you want and do anything you like with it. It should work with most mapping applications that support layers.
• This works great on your mobile phone. It works with Google Maps for Blackberry and Android, Google Earth for iOS, and it should work with any map software that supports google layers or importing kml data. Combined with your phones GPS, it's pretty handy when you're in the field.
• This is a work in progress, and there's bound to be gaps and occasional errors. Local councils often provide patchy data.
• For similar projects try Freecycle Perth , Free items on gumtree, and the Perth Kerbside Collection Facebook page.
• If you have any suggestions or updated information, email me or add a comment below. 
• I can't believe I'm putting this in, but it keeps coming up: If you want to interview me about verge collecting or the map, emailing me the questions is the easiest and most reliable way to get a response.

View Perth Verge Collections in a larger map

Local Government Areas currently mapped:
Click on a council to see their information page about bulk rubbish.

• City of Canning
• City of Cockburn
• City of Fremantle
• City of Joondalup
• City of Mandurah
• City of Melville
• City of Nedlands
• City of Perth
• City of Rockingham
• City of South Perth
• City of Stirling
• City of Subiaco
• City of Swan
• City of Vincent
• City of Wanneroo
• Town of Bassendean
• Town of Cambridge
• Town of Claremont
• Town of Cottesloe
• Town of East Fremantle
• Town of Kwinana
• Town of Mosman Park
• Town of Victoria Park
• Shire of Mundaring
• Shire of Peppermint Grove

Local Government Areas currently lacking data:
If you have one of the council verge collection pamphlets for these areas, please let me know

• City of Bayswater - NO VERGE COLLECTION
• City of Belmont - NO VERGE COLLECTION
• City of Armadale - Only distributes pamphlets to houses?
• City of Gosnells - Mapping data difficult to extract
• Shire of Kalamunda - NO VERGE COLLECTION, replaced with skip bins.

Using this on the move:

• Sign into your google account and save the map above to your account. This will allow you to access it from any program that supports layers.
• If you have an android phone, use the built-in google maps. When you go to load layers, it will appear on the list of options.
• If you have a blackberry phone, install google maps for Blackberry. You can sign into your account via the menu and load layers.
• If you have an iPhone/iPad, install Google earth. Sign into your google account, and load the layers from there.

Here's a screenshot of what the ipad version looks like on the move - The blue dot is your current location. It makes it damn easy to work out the edges of verge pickup.