Immediately after the 2013 Alexandra Truck Show, the show committee set about improving voice and data capabilities for the ten to twelve thousand visitors in attendance. The committee engaged several in the Telstra hierarchy and were assured assistance after a distinct lack of capability to make a phone call at the 2013 show.

In late 2013, we were introduced to Jim Rogers, Telstra Team Manager Seymour, Southern Region, who worked tirelessly to see that a project to improve mobile voice and data availability was raised – and delivered.

But, it wasn’t all that straightforward.

You see, there were hurdles to cross to improve the service, not the least being the lack of a 3-phase outlet in the Alexandra Exchange building. One hurdle crossed..

On Wednesday, 4 June, a mobile COW rolled into town, and her 12m antenna mast raised.

Clearly an exception on the parking rule was in order for this exceptional 3.5 tonne appliance.

Then there was the huge task of coordinating data routing from Alexandra, via Seymour to the Melbourne data on-ramp in Exhibition St.

Note the two cables that enter the COW:  The 3-phase power and the blue optic fibre data cable.

As opposed to a SatCOW (a literal Satellite Cell on Wheels) as was used nearby during the 2009 bushfire emergency, this appliance is connected directly by fibre. Within the exchange building the fibre is spliced into the terrestrial network.

Fortunately for those of us who struggle with acronyms, there was no requirement for a MEOW (Mobile Exchange on Wheels).

Jim Rogers was instrumental in the provisioning of this important infrastructure and drew the attention of visiting Indi Member of Parliament, Cathy McGowan MHR, at the annual Alexandra Truck, Ute & Rod Show dinner on 7 June. One feels the Member for Indi may have other projects in mind for the industrious people of Alexandra.

Our sincere thanks to Jim Rogers for such a successful result.

Transport industry and corporate support continues to be received by the Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show towards the construction and materials cost for the Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial that is under construction in Rotary Park Alexandra.

The latest support has come by way of a donation from the CMV Foundation of the CMV (Commercial Motor Vehicles) group which has provided a cheque for $5,000 to the project.

The CMV Foundation’s charter is to make donations and provide support to worthy causes in the broader community.

Since it was founded in 1953 by the late Sidney Crawford substantial funds have been donated to developing social responsibility and awareness while assisting those less fortunate.

Another supporter is the Hallam Truck Centre which with its associated business Bayswater Truck Centre is a major Victorian distributor of Kenworth, DAF and Fuso trucks of all sizes and types.

The Hallam Truck Centre group also an exhibitor at the Truck Show has contributed $3,000 to the Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial project.

Additional support has also come in the form of a $1,000 donation from Western Truck Towing & Repairs a major transport industry and vehicle towing and repair business based in the Melbourne suburb of Newport.

Alexandra Truck Rod & Ute Show President Matt Ellis said the financial support from industry is highly valued and appreciated by the organising committee.

“While we have received significant donations of materials and plenty of volunteer labour help from local tradespersons in building the memorial, the funds are nevertheless highly appreciated.

The Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial in Rotary Park is designed to provide a permanent place of memory and reflection for the partners and families of those who may have lost their lives in transport related accidents.

The Memorial will be officially opened on Saturday 7 June at 2 pm to precede the annual Truck Show.

We invite members of the local community and from throughout Victoria to attend and to witness the dedication ceremony..

The Memorial is a joint project of the Creative Ministries Network of United Care, the Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show with able support provided by the Murrindindi Shire Council.

Families wishing to participate or have their members name recorded on the memorial are invited to contact Bette Phillips at United Care on 0409 768 883.

Liz Martin who is the CEO of the major Australian Transport Hall of Fame in Alice Springs is also the project patron and will be visiting Alexandra for the official opening and the Truck Show weekend.

Providing their support to the Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial in Rotary Park are from left Show President Matt Ellis, Carmel Brudenell, Bette Phillips from Uniting Care, committee member Andrew Embling, Daniel Crawford and Jamie Howard from Hallam Truck Centre and committee man Gordon Simpson.

The Alexandra Quilters are an active local community group and their display of their craft work has long been a feature of the Truck Ute & Rod Show,

The Quilters will again have all their work on show in the Alexandra Shire Hall with their display available from 2 pm on Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday.

Admission to the display is only a $2 coin and visitors also gain a complimentary entry to judge what they consider to be the best quilt of the show.

There is also the opportunity to buy a raffle ticket with the prize being one of the amazing high quality, colourful and handmade local quilts.

Tickets are only $2 and the funds raised in the raffle will be provided this year to support the Alexandra Playgroup.

This will maintain the long tradition of the Alexandra Quilters in supporting worthy community organisations by donations of the funds raised by their display.

Quilting is a traditional craft which is actively supported in many communities.

It is often associated with the Amish community of the USA although there are numerous variations in many other parts of the world.

The Alexandra Quilters group has over forty members who participate in their teaching lessons and exchange of ideas.

Denise Fiddes secretary of the group says that a quilt can often involve one hundred hours of more of time input from the sourcing of the materials to the detail involved in stitching the final quilt together.

She says there are very few towns in Victoria that are without an active quilters group.

“We recently travelled as a group to Castlemaine to see the work that their local quilters group is doing and to swap ideas.

“Quilting provides a lot of enjoyment, relaxation, even therapy to for a lot of people.

“And quilting has a great tradition in many societies and is clearly a very active interest in many other countries”.

It looks like possibly sixty locally handcrafted quilts will be on display in the Alexandra Shire Hall as a feature event associated with the Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show.

Denise Fiddes (left) with Jennie de Frietas of the Alexandra Quilters group with one of the beautifully designed and hand crafted quilts that can be viewed in the expanded display on Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday of the Truck Ute & Rod Show.

The display in the Shire Hall on Saturday afternoon and all day on Sunday will be one of the biggest ever with a $2 gold coin for entry and a vote in judging the best quilt of the show.

Funds raised in the $2 raffle for a beautiful quit will go this year to the Alexandra Playgroup.

The website of Greg Champion or ‘Champs’ is clear about his career and offerings describing him as “a singer, songwriter, country/folk musician, corporate entertainer, musical comedian, radio personality and event host”.

In addition Greg is widely liked and recognised for his regular role on the acclaimed and much enjoyed ABC Radio program ‘The Coodabeen Champions’.

Well Greg or Champs will attract key interest at this year’s Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show where he will head the musical entertainment bill from the main stage in Grant Street on the Sunday.

Greg will also participate in the dedication ceremony for the Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial on the Saturday afternoon in Rotary Park in Alexandra.

Doubtless he will have an appropriate musical contribution with a trucking or transport theme.

Also joining Champs on the main stage will be the talented and very successful Australian country band Jetty Road whose ‘Far Away Places’ Album recently achieved 40 weeks on the ARIA Australian Country Albums Chart.

Their song “I am a Dreamer’ was also a finalist in the latest International Country Song Competition.

These sorts of accolades reflect the band’s musical talents and continuing creative development.

Also making a guest appearance will be Emma Hales who has an almost local background, coming from the nearby Yarra Valley.

Emma’s contribution to the recent Alexandra Easter Festival was judged as something special so she has been invited to perform again.

As a singer-songwriter her style and presentation has country, roots and blues features and she is a strong addition to the program.

Over the past eighteen years the Truck Show Committee has always engaged top musical talents with widespread appeal to perform and provide the main musical entertainment.

With the bookings of Greg Champion and Jetty Road and also Emma Hales the bill this year will maintain the record and reputation for good country music and entertainment.

Over the past seventeen years the annual Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show has created a record as arguably the biggest community event in Murrindindi Shire.

This year’s edition, the eighteenth, will be held on the Sunday, June 8 of the Queen’s Birthday Long Weekend when Grant Street and surrounding areas of the town will fill with one of the biggest and most comprehensive truck, equipment and public interest events that brings somewhere between twelve and fifteen thousand people to the town.

Truck Show Committee member Andrew Embling says that it is always important to present a number of new features and to see that existing features are expanded for each year for the Show, as a free public event for which there is no admission charge.

For instance “Alexandra has increasingly been selected by the major highway truck manufacturers as the place to release and show their new trucks.  “I think that reflects the status of our Alexandra Show as a place to present the latest in the trucking and transport sectors”.

“In addition this year’s Woodchop Competition sponsored again by VicForests will have two Victorian Championship events.

All the usual Truck Ute and Rod Show events will be staged from the major displays of all types of vehicles to the traditional auction on Sunday afternoon, to the continuous live music and the traditional Alexandra Quilters display.

This year the Show’s raffle offers significant prizes from Honda Australia to be shared between the first, second and third tickets drawn.

Raffle tickets are $5 or five for $20 and are available now from local traders or can be purchased on the day.

“The Alexandra Truck Ute and Rod Show is supported by businesses throughout the local area and brings a major economic boost to the district through accommodation, meals and retail purchases both on the day and over the weekend.

“We will also have more than a dozen local auxiliaries from football, netball, kindergarten and primary school support groups who will be selling their traditional soups, hamburgers, sausages and egg and bacon sandwiches on the day.

“Every one of these groups earns a significant boost to their finances through their involvement” Andrew Embling says, so this is another way that benefits flow through to the local community.

Most of Alexandra’s main street traders are also open for business for what has become for many their busiest trading day of the year. Another feature event that always draws a big crowd is the annual Woodchop competition in Rotary Park which puts many of our finest axeman to the challenge with standing block, tree climbing and power sawing events that are ranked as amongst the most competitive in Australia.

The Woodchop completion also has major support from VicForests and the Central Victorian Axeman’s Association and is always worth a look.

The web site at www.alexandratruckshow.com.au is regularly updated with new information or enquiries can be made to Gordon Simpson on 0409 577 212 or Andrew Embling on 0418 266 038.

Alexandra’s Grant and surrounding streets will be filled to capacity again for the 18th annual Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show to be held on Sunday June 8 of the Queen’s Birthday long weekend.

Visitors come from near and far to see the extensive displays of all types of equipment, historic, restored and restorable vehicles and music throughout the day.

There is also the public auction, major raffle prizes to be won and entertainment and music throughout the day.

It is an event from which the whole community benefits.

Get your tickets for your chance to be the happy owner of some great Honda gear from Honda corporate and our local Honda dealer, Alexandra Motorcycles. Remember that all proceeds go to charitable causes like building and maintaining the Victorian Truck Drivers’ Memorial in Alexandra.

Get 5 tickets for $20 in the main street of Alexandra each Saturday morning. The prizes are to be drawn on Show day.

A very early example of one of the Scanias on which the company established its reputation in Australia has been restored to its former glory and will be proudly on show at the 2014 Alexandra Truck Show.

A 1976 L 111 bonneted Scania 4×2 has been brought back to life thanks to some dedicated effort by Scania’s parts team and local truck restorers.

The truck has been repainted in its original colour scheme, as specified by its first owner, Bill Larsen, who used it for logging in the foothills of the Great Dividing Range, around Mount Bogong and Lightning Creek in the state of Victoria.

“I liked the style of the truck, that’s what drew me to it first,” he says. “Scania appealed to me with its European looks and also it had cross diff locks, which were essential for the terrain I had to drive through.

“It was very manoeuvrable, and the single-drive was good on tyres, which was important in the bush. The gearing was very well suited to the task and it had excellent brakes. The springs were strong enough to take a heavy load, as well,” he recalls.

It was very muddy on the logging routes in those days.

The L111 was not Bill’s first Scania, as he had owned a new L 110 previously. He later bought a stream of Scanias graduating to an early V8 142H, using them all in his logging transport business into the end of the 1980s.

“The Scania was good to drive, much better than American trucks. They had a better steering lock as well, and they were much quieter in the cab. It was unusual to see a Scania in the logging industry at the time,” he says.

Scania enjoyed a strong reputation over many decades in Europe in the logging industry, as it does today. In northern Europe, Scania is a popular choice in the snow-covered logging routes that demand excellent grip, reliability and strength.

“I used the L 111 in the softwood logging industry for 10 years,” Bill says.

“We switched to softwood when you couldn’t access the hardwood forest anymore. Much of that area is National Park now.

“The truck was painted in Hamersley Brown and Caterpillar Yellow and it had my name on the doors. For much of my career I ran 4 to 5 trucks. After I traded the L 111 I lost track of it. I recall someone saying it was painted red and blue,” he says.

The truck was indeed painted in these colours when Scania acquired it in WA a few years ago.

Construction is commencing on Victoria’s first permanent Truck Drivers Memorial in Rotary Park at the corner of Grant & Vickery Streets in Alexandra.

The project which has a project cost estimated at $50,000 is a joint initiative of the annual Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show and the Work-Related Grief Support Services of the Creative Ministries Network.

Its purpose is to provide families and friends of the quite significant number of drivers who have lost their lives in truck or transport related accidents with a non-denominational memorial site and place where they can honour the men and women who have died while going about their work.

The present Australian Truck Drivers Memorial is in Tarcutta NSW and although well supported it is often an inconvenient place to travel to for family, friends and industry colleagues.

The project for Alexandra has been initiated by the Alexandra Truck Ute & Rod Show the major community event held each year on the Sunday of the June long weekend.

This year’s show will be the held on Sunday 8 June and will be the 18^th annual series of the event which attracts significant transport industry support and brings a large number of people to Alexandra for the free event.

Andrew Embling President of the Alexandra Tourism & Traders Association says “the Memorial is being built on a very visible site within the Alexandra Township.

“We have been fortunate in receiving the support of ten or more local tradespersons – builders, concreters, bricklayers and electricians who are contributing their time as volunteers in building the Memorial.

“In addition virtually all the construction materials are being donated by local and other Victorian suppliers.

“Our local Murrindindi Shire Council has also been a key supporter with technical advice, design and engineering input.”

The structure measures about 2.6 metres in height and has a base width exceeding 6 metres.

Its main construction will be local stone and rendered brickwork and will be faced with Corten Steel panels and already some forty families have expressed their wish in having memorial plaques for their family members placed on the memorial.

Mr Embling says the project is designed to be completed ahead of this year’s Alexandra Truck, Ute & Rod Show.

On Saturday 15 February commencing from 11 am there will also be an official blessing of the Memorial to be conducted by the Rev John Bottomley of the Creative Ministries Network.

He will be joined by Dan O’Farrell Chaplain of the Toll Transport Group.

Also in attendance will be Liz Martin the CEO of the Transport Hall of Fame in Alice Springs who is the Patron of the Alexandra memorial project.

A large family and community gathering will also attend on Sunday 15 February.

“What we are creating is a place of quite reflection in Alexandra for partners, family and friends of those who have lost their lives in transport or trucking accidents.

“Having a permanent place for recognition is judged as a real social and community benefit.

“The support we have received in offers of volunteer labour to build the project as well as donated materials is outstanding” Andrew Embling says.

Local Alexandra and district tradesmen met on site in Rotary Park Alexandra for a preliminary progress meeting and construction has already commenced on the Victorian Truck Drivers Memorial with the community project valued at $50,000 now well underway.

For more information or interview: Andrew Embling 0418 266 038