BILL Hickey’s face would be very familiar to those attending the regional saleyards.
Even though Bill is now retired, you will still see him hanging over a stock fence or gate or having a chat with one of his many colleagues or friends.
But how does a boy who grew up in West Preston, Melbourne, end up spending his life working in the stock game?
The answer to that question, is that Bill’s grandparents were share farmers near Gunnedah, with stock, and draft horses - “and I’ve always been horse mad since I was old enough to look out the window - and the neighbours across the road had stock trucks, general trucks and show horse’s - and from the time I was about 10, I practically lived there.”
The love of all things agricultural was imbedded from a very young age.
Bill explained that he spent most of his time as a “young fella” across the road, with the family with the trucks.
They had the contract for Hutton’s abattoirs - so Bill became a regular at Newmarket - helping out at every opportunity.
It was Bill’s mother that saw an advertisement in the paper from the Agents Association for a booking clerk at Newmarket and suggested that he apply.
“You see now, it’s the councils that book the sale days - but back then, it was the Agents Association – so for the first six months that I was there - I was a booking clerk - I was about 17 years old - and it was a stepping stone to getting a job with an agent.”
Now Bill did get a job with a dairy agent - who he respected and admired greatly, but unfortunately; that respect and admiration, did not extend to the agent’s son.
This led to Bill having a change of direction and working with a mulesing contractor from Warren in NSW. This enabled Bill to see a lot of the country north through Parkes, to the Queensland border and beyond. This was seasonal work – so when Bill was finished with that, he would head back to Melbourne and drive tip trucks. Then when the season started up again, Bill would be back up north.
Bill can recall the 1969 season, when they mulesed 196,000 lambs.
“They were charging eight cents per lamb, and I was getting a quarter of that – two cents,” he said.
He does remember getting two cheques - “one cheque for $200 for cashing and one cheque for either $1300 or $1500 - I can’t remember exactly - but I didn’t know anybody with that sort of money!”
“Anyway, I was truck mad, so I bought a truck - but I had no idea how to get work - the stupidest thing - it taught me one thing - if you are going to buy a pub, then go and work in one, if you want to be a newsagent, then go and work in a newsagency - so after a few months, I sold the truck to one of my uncles.”
“I went back up for the next season - it was when the a*** fell out of the wool market and we did 100,000 lambs - almost half what we did the year before.
“I ended up back working at Newmarket and driving tip trucks and low loaders. I was driving a Mack and thought I was King of the Road - I’d always loved Mack, since I was a kid.”
“I went back up to Warren share farming for a while and then I bought a Mack, then a 1418 Benz.
“Then in 1976, one of my mates who was a mechanic and involved in motor racing (he was building Allan Moffat’s race car) - got me the job of driving the Ford Motor Racing truck.
The previous year the Ford Racing truck and had caught fire and they lost the truck, the car and all the equipment.
“Then in 1977, Moffatt’s Ford Racing cars finished one and two – they won all thirteen races and finished second, twelve times ,” Bill said.
The celebrations included a week at the Sydney Hilton, refreshments and flash new clothes for the presentation dinner.
1978 saw Bill back working out of Newmarket or driving tip trucks. It also marked the start of Bill’s association with camp drafting. In the early 1980’s, Bill bought a F 86, dual cab Volvo with a horse float and took 16 horses up into the Kimberley’s and spent a season or two, up there mustering, drafting and droving - it was a great way of life for Bill.
“I had known Bill and David McKibbin from years before at Newmarket, and when I got home from the Kimberley in late 1982, I went to the trots one night and the first bloke I ran into is David McKibbin - and not long after Bill McKibbin rocked up.
After a night of re-hydration, Bill was asked to turn up at the depot at 7am with his prime mover with a single deck cattle crate.
Holding pens were precious at Newmarket - McKibbin’s had leased pens - so Sundays were spent taking stock to Borthwicks or Campbells Abattoirs for processing on the Monday.
“I did five loads that day - each trip was only around 10km, back and forth, and took around half an hour,” Bill said.
“During the week, that same trip would take at least twice as long.
“I got paid $250, used $10 of fuel and they said come back Tuesday. So, I did.”
“I subbed (sub contracted) for them from 1983 -1995.
“Then one of their drivers tipped a truck over and David said ‘If you go and buy a bogie drive truck, then you can replace that one. I said beauty, and I bought a V8 Scania - had it for 40 months and spent $37,000 in repairs.
“Anyway, I bought a F model, cab over Mack – a good ole truck – I did 1.3 million kilometres in it, and put a new clutch, centre bearing and universal joint in it! I traded the cab over in for another Mack Superliner.
“We were running from Charlton Feedlot to Toowoomba and really clocking up the k’s.
“The bean counters in their wisdom decided that they didn’t want to outlay for refrigeration so they wanted the stock on trucks in Toowoomba, through processing and into the shops!
“Now, we all know meat has to hang, but ‘no’; they knew best!
“Well, that didn’t work for long!”
Bill has done stints at Re-Car and Byrne Trailers but was asked back to McKibbin’s Transport as an employee. He readily admits that he has worked for and with some great people over the years, and some ‘not so great’ (I cleaned that up Bill!), but “David and Bill McKibbon are quality people and you always felt that they had your back”.
Bill retired in 2016.
Of course, that means that you will still see him where he loves to be - at the saleyards, at the local camp drafts and around the trucks.
