Christopher Goulstone SCHADE: Welder -

Lived Church Street - DOB 19/12/1946

A bit of a loss except sports and roster work.

Jack Roy Tyson MATTHEWS: 1959 Team - Farmer - Lived Elginbah - some distance
out of town. DOB 15/03/1928.
Rarely available these days owing to pressures of Shire and Murrumbidgee County
Council work. Ex Chairman, always willing if about town.

John Austin BLOMFIELD: 1959 Team - Farmer - Lived Belmont Booligal - DOB
04/02/1938.
Lives 60 minutes out of Hay, still willing for long distance trips with notice. John was extremely useful for
local knowledge and would assist with cases in the Booligal area.

Ian William MILLIKEN: Lived Rosevale - DOB 27/04/1948.

Lives 10 miles out of town, willing to do long distance trips with notice, good and likes sports.

Henry GIFFORD: 1976 - Lived Macauley Street - 05/05/1939.

( THE SO CALLED GOOD FRIEND OF MINE ??
OR SO I THOUGHT, TURNED OUT NOT TO BE.)

SOME OF YOU WILL KNOW EXACTLY WHY.

Colin HONEYMAN: Joined October 1976 - Lived in Water Street.

Colin joined the permanent staff in January 1977.

There were apparently many hair raising trips by the Honoraries to Melbourne over the times, and a few
in my time as well. And sometimes the man off the street, Ron Prevett was one of those as he lived near
Alan Myers and was often co-opted to assist. Apparently there was a lot of ‘shopping’ done in Melbourne
by the Nurses. This of course ceased when I took over, much to the Nurses dismay.
 ROBERTS’ HISTORY AT HAY

On the first of May 1975 I commenced as the

first permanent Station Officer appointed the
then Hay District Ambulance Service. I had
been given the choice of three stations by
Superintendent John Bradford, namely
Coleambally, Hay or Ivanhoe. There was no
Ambulance Station and no Hospital at
Coleambally, still no Hospital today, Ivanhoe
was under the RFDS and was and still is
more isolated than Hay. As my wife was a
Registered Nurse so we decided to accept
the offer of Hay, the intention was to stay for
THE AMBULANCES AT HAY IN MAY 1975
about twelve month and then move on to a higher position
(maybe Deputy Superintendent, DOM).

In today's climate thank God and anyone else for that matter, for not having gone up the administrative
line. The ‘shit’ that now rains down from above is intolerable. That’s what was expected in those days,
there were Deputy Superintendents everywhere. There were Deputies at Deniliquin, Griffith, with two at
Wagga and Albury.

I retired from the position Advanced Life Support (ALS)

Paramedic Station Officer, Level 4 on the 7th February 2020, after
more than 50 years. ALS Officer are now dinosaurs, and not many
left alive.

The weekend before I arrived a Police Officer was shot at Maude

during an incident – wondered what sort of town I was coming to.

When I came to Hay it was known as the Hay District Ambulance

Service, it then become Murrumbidgee District Ambulance Service.
Some time later with some reorganisation it become the Riverina
District Ambulance Service. There have been many name changes
since. Every time there was a review or restructure or reorganisation, there was a name change.
Sometimes it was aligned to the local health area, sometimes to a geographical area. At some time in the
mid eighties at a Station Officers conference at the Police Academy in Goulburn, I was asked to give a
presentation. I gave a rendition of Lucky Stars version of "I've been everywhere". ( without the singing) I
have been everywhere but not left home. It related to all the name changes that I had experienced since
my time in the service. I would hate to start the presentation today, forty odd years on, it would take me a
week to get through it.

I started in the Goulburn District Ambulance Service, I moved to Tumbarumba in the Murrumbidgee
District Ambulance Service, moved to Hay in the Hay District Ambulance Service. Then came the name
changes without moving, Hay District Ambulance Service back to Murrumbidgee District Ambulance
Service, then to Riverina District Ambulance Service, then to South West Region Ambulance. And so it
has gone on and on and on. In 2000 or so it went back to Murrumbidgee Area.
Every time there was a name change, all the paper work changed and the way things were done
changed. Not forgetting that the NSW Ambulance changed from, the NSW Ambulance Service to
Ambulance NSW, to just Ambulance……. and in 2014 back to the future NSW Ambulance, and some
bureaucrat thinks its new……. Welcome back to the future! It keeps on repeating itself.

There was a Regional Superintendent, one of many, after one of those realignment / re-organisations,
restructures, call it what you may, by the name of Allan Henderson, who, at a Station Officers conference
made a very pertinent comment. Allan Henderson was known as IPEC, for those who would not
remember there was a transport company that made deliveries all over the country called IPEC. They
were known for their speedy deliveries, passing every one else on the road. ( I pass every c… ) .
"Station Officers” need to make a decision as to which direction they wish to go in the service, either up
the administrative line, or down the clinical line, you can not do both well." From that comment I decided
to follow the clinical line.

However we are still here some fifty years later, with not intention of leaving – retirement is looking good
in Hay. There have been many very good Officers who tried to go both ways at once, their trails can be
seen by the roadside. No reflection on the person, you can scale the ladder, but it’s a slippery snake on
the way down if you choose that route.

Shortly after I arrived in Hay there was a meet and greet upstairs at the Commercial Hotel. Most of the
Honoraries and their wives were in attendance along with Superintendent John Bradford and Shire
Council representatives, including Marg Tight, Shire receptionist. Marg took the Ambulance subscriptions.
Superintendent Bradford was apparently instrumental in negotiations with the Hay Board in the
amalgamation of Hay with Wagga and the appointment of a permanent Officer.

The early days in Hay were interesting times, there were members of Hay Honorary Staff and Nursing
Staff at the Hay Hospital, that believed that there should be a permanent Officer and those who still
wanted it to be Honorary. This made it a little difficult in the beginning with considerable resistance to the
change. Knowing who was in which camp took some working out. Anything that I did around town in the
beginning was reported to the Superintendent John Bradford within twenty four hours – or less in some
instances.

The manner of my driving, my clinical treatment and the number of times I went down the street all being
reported back. Taking the ambulance down the street on my "days off" created some discussion. That
was until one day I was at the Shire Council and a person was knocked down on the pedestrian crossing
just outside. Funny that, I did not have to return to the station ( at the Gaol ) to get the Ambulance to treat
the patient. One has to understand that Hay had been an Honorary Ambulance Service since its
inception in 1938.

The Honorary Service was made up of a group of different individuals, as listed above, Honorary
Superintendent, (Leigh Marshall) and Deputy Superintendent (Lou Gurney) and up to fifteen or so
'bearers' as they were called. All of those who were 'honoraries' had regular jobs in the community and
undertook ambulance cases on a needs basis. They were trained in First Aid by the local Doctors.

BABY TO MELBOURNE FIRST TRIP

Call after lunch for an urgent transport of a newborn baby to Melbourne, my first trip to Melbourne from
Hay. The escort nurse was my wife Cheryl. The baby was born with a “H” type fistula between the
trachea and the oesophagus, which meant that every time the baby was fed it nearly drowned. This was
a hot response to Melbourne, the first fuel stop was at the Ambulance Station in Echuca.
The station was called on the radio to alert them that we would be in for fuel and were in a hurry, the car
was fuelled and we continued, the paper work will be done on the return. The same happened at Kilmore.
After consulting the ‘Gregory’s’ map book it was considered that the straight way to the Royal Children’s
hospital down Sydney Road was the best option.
For any one who knows, you run into trams just north of Coburg. We hit Coburg at five o’clock. It took a
little while to realise that trams can’t, wont, get out of your way under lights and sirens. What I did work
out quickly was that when the tram heard or saw you coming they would pull up across the intersection
so that nothing could cross the intersection from my right. Having a large ‘bullbar’ on the front of the
ambulance certainly helped clear the way. It was a very quick trip.

The first permanent Station and Residence was in the eastern residence of the Old Hay Gaol located in
Church Street. Twelve months earlier the Gaol was being used as a child welfare institution for the twelve
worst girls in the state. This house was where Ambulance business was conducted from in the early
days. The back verandah was the office and the big shed housed the ambulance. Ambulance
subscriptions were paid at the station and at the Hay Shire Council office. The ambulance subscriptions
had normally been sent out with the Shire rate notices. It was one of my duties to go to the Shire and
collect the money and bank it. This continued until some bright “bureaucrat” decided that the Ambulance
subscription was no longer of value. The service lost some five million dollars a year in income. I worked
a roster, sort of, the job was work dependent. Some working days you would not do anything, then on
your 'days off' you would work all of them. This still happens today. You were on call 24/7. With an
understanding District Superintendent, John Bradford, I was able to get ten days or more off every two to
three months. Officer Terry Nelson and his father Sam Nelson from Wagga would come out for the ten to
twelve days and stay in the spare bedroom in the station residence. This allowed us to go home to
Goulburn for a change in pace. Sam Nelson was an ex Superintendent at Temora who had relinquish his
rank to that of Station Officer.

There is a story told by Sam in relation to people not speaking to someone, Sam in particular. The story
goes; there was a particular Sister (RN) at Wagga base hospital who would not speak when spoken to.
Sam would always say good morning or good afternoon as the case may be, when he met anyone in the
corridor at the hospital. He was that sort of bloke. This sister would just ignore him. So after many times
of being ignored Sam decided a different approach was in order to get her attention. This particular
morning Sam said 'good morning sister' and as usual he was ignored. Sam then said 'get fornicated
sister', her reply was "what did you say", Sam politely replied, I thought you heard me the first time, good
morning sister and walked on. You could not do that today and get away with it.

THE FIRST BIG JOB IN HAY.

One of the first accidents I did was late one afternoon, the girl on the
exchange rang and advised where the accident was, out the
Balranald road – a car had rolled. Allan Japp (chemist) would be
waiting out the front of his shop – pick him up. John McNeill-Simpson
(solicitor) would get the second ambulance out and Leigh Marshall
(Holden dealer) would join him. All arranged by the girls on the
exchange.

Probably one of the first co-ordination centres and probably

more efficient at times than our current system, at least the
information they got was “relevant”, no idiot sheet to follow,
they just used ‘common sense’.

This apparently was how it was done, the girls knew who was
available, where they were and would just organise them. In other
cases they would tell me who was available and where when I rang
to organise an honorary.
There were a number of patients injured in the accident, one of them thrown out of the car. When I came
up to the accident I saw that there was stuff strewn along the side of the road. I went past where I thought
the stuff started. When I pulled off the road to make a U turn, I almost ran over the patient on the side of
the road in the long grass. The ambulance I took was the V8 Holden panel van, single stretcher car. It
went like a scalded cat but kept blowing cylinder head gasket. When I arrived someone on scene made
the comment that this car was not enough, I turned and pointed back towards Hay – there is another one,
F100 four stretcher car on the way, red lights on the horizon.

After assessing the scene, treating the patients and getting the patients to the Hay Hospital for treatment,
it was off to Griffith. Russell Hutchinson (county council linesman) drove the ambulance to Griffith with me
looking after two serious patients. I found out many months later that the Honorary Officers were very
impressed with the way the accident scene was managed, thanks to the girls on the exchange. It
appeared that as a result of my handling of this accident that it changed some minds about having a
permanent Officer in Hay. Some of the non believers changed their minds, some it did not. There were
many other times that the Honorary Officers were used. They also covered town when I was undertaking
transfers to Griffith, Wagga or Melbourne. Melbourne was about a twelve to thirteen hour return trip.

It was not unusual for information to get back to Superintendent Bradford in a very short time. Fortunately
the Superintendent did not take too much of an interest in the information. The Superintendent was in
town on one of his visits, so I related that he would probably be advised that I had gone round a corner
on two wheels. His reply to the comment was “I hope it was just on one, the steering wheel”. I guessed
that he did not put much credence on the information he was getting.

The girls on the manual phone exchange were very helpful when it came to arranging honoraries to do
jobs. A couple of names come to mind, Irene Timms (supervisor), Glenda Previtt and Jan Eames, still a
friend today, Janis Skene, Lee Young (he was on on the morning of the Busselton bus accident) They
had a list of honoraries at the exchange and like most manual exchanges knew where everyone was and
what everyone was doing. There were many times that you advised the exchange supervisor not to put
calls through unless they were urgent due to having been up all night and this worked most times. The
girls on the manual exchange were ‘affectionately’ known as the “bitch on the switch”. Three minutes, are
you extending was the remark when you were on a ‘trunk call’. (Long distant call).

One morning after being up all night and getting to bed around 6 am the supervisor rang about 8 a.m.
and advised ‘sorry' to disturb you, but I think this is an emergency, there is a lady coming in from
Carrathool and she is having a baby'. I asked her to ring the hospital and tell one of the maternity sisters
that I would be picking her up in a few minutes to come with me. You could not do that sort of thing these
days. Hay lost its maternity unit many years ago, now only has a so called birthing room. Since about
2019 Ambulance Paramedics have been trained highly in emergency child birth. This is a result of
Hospitals closing their Maternity wards. Its either to save money or shift responsibility. I had delivered
more babies on the road or in the Hospital in the last five years than on the previous 45 years.

As we arrived at the river road near the TV tower we met a stationery car just in time to find that the
husband had delivered the baby on the back seat. (The husband remarked many years later, not much
difference to delivering a calf or a lamb). The parents were to become good friend’s years later, (rent a
crowd) the baby girl was to become my sons’ best friend throughout their school years, they were born
around the same time. I regularly see Kylie and remind her that she is my special girl.