Simon Chamberlain's experience with AA Company | The Land
The Land's Simon Chamberlain retells stories from his time working with AA Company in the 1980s.
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00:00My story with the AA Company began in 1980.
00:05I'm standing here at the moment just a few kilometres from the head station of what Gunungurru established
00:10when it moved over the Ranges in 1841 to build their massive sheep herd and their cattle herd
00:17after the misfortune of choosing country at Port Stephens.
00:21It wasn't sheep country.
00:23Most of the horses on the station had that famous axehead brand from the King Ranch
00:28and the cattle had the BDT, Brunette Downs Territory brand.
00:32There was about 25 of us young blokes went up there.
00:35As they drifted off and went to other places they were replaced by Aboriginal stockmen
00:39which was really fascinating for us.
00:41One of the things I first learned about going up to the Territory was everybody got a nickname
00:45so I'd taken a bus from Melbourne to Mount Isa which took me about three days with stops
00:52and we met at the Coppergate Motel in Mount Isa and the head stockman's wife, Leslie Oatsman
00:58looked at me and she said, you look like Prince Charles and I became known as Charlie from there on.
01:04There was another bloke from Melbourne, Dave Cordner, who was an Aussie rules player of some note.
01:09He looked like a bloke called Murray who came from Kangaroo Island so his nickname was Murray.
01:15The stock camps were interesting. We lived out in the swag.
01:19All week we'd come in on a Saturday night, have a shower.
01:22Those of us who could shave, we'd have a shave.
01:25We'd get to watch a movie, generally a vampire sort of horror thing
01:29which would scare the doughnuts out of the local residents.
01:33And we had a ration of four cans of Victoria Bitter Beer which was administered by the cooks
01:39and General Top Bloke, Palmby Bolt, Fullston.
01:42Oh, interesting people, you know.
01:44The work was hard. I was in number two camp.
01:47It was responsible for getting and cleaning out a lot of the country west of the Beef Road
01:52which had been flooded and the lakes were beginning to recede
01:57and there was a lot of clean sitting cattle.
01:59We spent a lot of time mustering that country Corella boar.
02:02We spent six weeks there mustering cattle around there.
02:05We had the pilot, Ian Tom Pup, Alas Valley Pup.
02:10He stacked his plane and didn't make it but he'd fly the Cessna 150 plane round the cattle
02:16and push them into the Turkey's Nest Dam.
02:18We'd hold them, tail them and take them to the yards
02:21and there they'd begin the process of the brucellosis and tuberculosis testing campaign, BTEC.
02:27Number three camp, there was only about five blokes in that camp.
02:30They would be tailing the cattle and waiting for the advice to come back from the laboratory at the headstation
02:36to see if there were any reactors and the reactors were blown away.
02:40That was it, end of the road.
02:42Number one camp, it worked the country in the eastern side of the Beef Road
02:46which is mainly the higher content Santa Gertrudes herds.
02:49There was always a bit of friendly rivalry between the number one and number two camp
02:53because we seemed to find that the cattle were a bit rougher and a bit more explosive where we worked
02:59and we thought number one camp blokes had it pretty soft.
03:02A couple of the blokes who worked with us were fellas that I often think of.
03:06One was a bloke called Hugh Ellis, he spent a lot of time breaking horses
03:09but he was also in the stock camp with us and his experience was pretty good
03:13because he taught us a lot about shearing horses and that sort of thing.
03:16And after we left Burnett Downs, he joined the Army I understand and ended up in the SAS
03:22and alas poor old Hughie, he was on one of those Blackhawks up at Townsville
03:25and I met his sister Miriam, she was a journalist with ABC Radio in Longreach
03:31and it was great for me to talk to her about what a great bloke Hughie was in the stock camp
03:37and what an interesting fella he was.
03:40Burnett was managed by Ken Warriner who was a larger than life character then and still is now I understand.
03:47Young fellas around the station used to talk about his favourite party trick
03:51was to lift a drum of Avgas off the ground onto a Land Cruiser.
03:55We never saw it, he'd done his back by then but we all sort of held him in great awe.
04:00It's a terrific feat of strength to lift 200 litres of Avgas onto the back of a Land Cruiser.
04:05Towards the end of my stay there, we were mustering around this boar called Paradise Boar
04:09which is up on the Anti-Lagoon boundaries
04:12and there was quite a few of the Brahman cattle come across from Anti-Lagoon.
04:17They were pretty wild and we had this black bull, we were trying to get it in but couldn't do it.
04:21Ken turned up and the station manager's Range Rover and Andy got a bit sick of this
04:26so he chased and ran down the bull with the Range Rover and pinned it
04:30and we got it in the yards and it went to Catherine to be processed.
04:34I'm not sure how they rectified that, where the brands were and all that sort of thing
04:38but it was good to see that bull heading up the back of a Duntine Territories road train.
04:45When I was at BEEF24 just a couple of months ago, I met a few of the blokes who were part of AA Company
04:51and the celebration they had for 200 years at BEEF24, Chairman, CEO
04:56and they entertained the Prime Minister, Mr Albanese.
05:00Took him to lunch, talked about the importance of the beef industry
05:05in the top end and also right through the country.
05:08Things aren't going to be easy for the beef industry, especially the top end.
05:12They rely so heavily on the live export trade and AA Company, they took a big step
05:18by establishing a meat works up in the top end but it's sitting on the reserve bench at the moment
05:22until things get more organised.
05:25I guess being part of the history of the company, even though it's a very small part,
05:31it's exciting because to be involved with a company that's had 200 years of agricultural influence
05:40in this nation's growth is pretty exciting and even though we didn't recognise it back then,
05:45it's good to have been part of it all.