My father was a sugar-cane farmer and farm labourer when I was born during the post-war "baby boom", in 1946. At the time, he worked on his father's farm at Gargett, about 45km (30 miles) west of Mackay, in the Pioneer Valley of North Queensland, Australia. I was the youngest of nine children: five boys and four girls. Eight of us survived to adulthood. My youngest sister died in 2001, six weeks before her 59th birthday. I am married to Annette (nee Courtice) and have one daughter, Susan (Sue).

My grandfather, John "Jack" Benson, arrived in Gargett as a pioneer farmer, around 1910. He was then in his early 40s. He was born at Condamine, Queensland, to Hans and Elizabeth Benson (nee Cuppage). Hans came from the Danish town of Flensburg, possibly as a stowaway, around 1862-65. He changed his family name and covered his tracks so well that his birth-name has never been positively confirmed by my generation of historians. In 1968, not long before his death, Hans' son-in-law said the family name "had a twang", but he could no longer pronounce it. In the mid-1990s, information from a distant cousin suggested it may have been Bërenstein.

Elizabeth arrived in Australia as a toddler with her mother and brother, George, from County Armagh, Ireland. Mystery surrounds her mother, Anne Cuppage (nee Hamilton), my great-great-grand-mother. She was listed in a ship's passenger list as "Mrs Cuppage" but there's been no indication a husband ever arrived in Australia. Anne had another child from an affair on a sheep property near Toowoomba, Queensland.

George died in a freak accident in Toowoomba when a horse reared and snapped the shaft of a sulky he was riding. It pierced his chest. It is believed Anne never recovered from witnessing the accident. The tale of George's death appears in verse on his headstone in an old Toowoomba cemetery.

Jack Benson had tree younger siblings, of whom only George and Alice survived. Elizabeth died around 1870, apparently from complications with pregnancy after falling over a log while chasing cows. Her death certificate shows she had an illness for about 10 days, so she may have had a lingering death. Hans married again within 12 months. Elizabeth's fourth child died soon afterwards.

Jack left home about the age of 10 years after disagreeing with his father, Hans Benson, over working with a team of bullocks and having to wear shoes. Little is known of Jack's whereabouts until he arrived in Gargett from McKinley, near Cloncurry, Queensland, around 1910. (McKinley Hotel was featured in the movie "Crocodile Dundee"). We have a little idea from places where Jack's children were born. His wife, my father's mother, Caroline Adelaide Benson (nee Horton) died in 1920, aged 40, from epithelioma (cancer of the face). She left a family of seven children aged from 2 to 15 years. Although Jack's brother, "GP" (George) and his wife Molly, arrived (probably from Gympie, Queensland) to help raise the family, the children had a very tough life. Jack and his sister-in-law didn't hit it off too well. The three elder sons - Jack, George and Jim - worked in the cane-fields as often as they went to school. When Carrie died, her youngest daughter, May, was but a toddler.

Jim was my father. As a six year old, his heel was mangled in the gears of a horse-powered chaff-cutter while riding the swing-bar and dangling his legs as the horse pulled it around in a circle. He was crippled in his lower right leg for life, having only the ball of his foot to walk on and very tender skin on his lower leg from the effects of skin and bone-grafts when in his later thirties when problems arose. Despite hobbling on home-made crutches or using a walking-stick, Jim had to pull his weight on the farm. Whenever I thought I had it tough in my formative years, such as walking 2.5 miles to and from school, dad often reminded me and my younger sisters that things could have been worse ... we didn't have to hobble 4 miles (6.4 km) to an from school on crutches with only bread and dripping (melted animal fat) or syrup for lunch.

My dad's hard work and farming innovations, and the poor treatment from his father whose farm he had saved from demise in the late 1930s, were described to me in 2000 by Llew Harris (dec. 2003), a WWII veteran who had known my father.

In 1952, after a three year stint on Bob Neilsen's farm at Septimus, near Gargett, we moved to our own sugarcane farm at Carmila West, a farming community in a coastal valley some 100 kilometres (60 miles) south of Mackay. In the early 1950s, life there was fairly primitive. On reflection, it was little short of having been in the wilderness. It was a much tougher life than most experience in contemporary Australia. Most small farmers lived similar lifestyles. I spent some of my formative years wandering about the farm, playing in creeks and gullies, eating cultivated and wild fruit in season, and occasionally climbing hills or mountains. I began using a pi-rifle (.22) to hunt when I was about 10 years of age, and fired a .303 Lee Enfield military rifle when I was a few years older. For a few years, my chores included rising well before dawn to go around cane paddocks searching and setting snares for wallabies and other pests that eat the cane, or killed our turkeys and fowls, and threatened our livelihood.

I always had plenty to occupy my time on our farm. I still have a fondness for the area that once was "home".

My father and an elder brother, Sid (Sidney), worked together on the farm. They loved fishing, so we often went to Carmila beach on Sundays where we met with friends who also liked fishing. It was a good chance for my mother to chat with other women. Dragging a bait net, plodding through mud, or sitting in a boat or on hard rocks all day gave me a dislike for beaches. With the prevalence of jelly stingers these days, I wonder what nasties lurked where I bobbed and dragged bait nets to shouts from my father and an elderly friend. Although I live within walking distance of a world-class, picturesque beach and talk about its qualities, I rarely venture there.

The valley of Carmila West had been farmed since the 1920s. In the 1950s, roads were poor and there were few bridges across creeks that became raging torrents in the wet season or after severe thunderstorms. Our mode of transport was a 1936 Morris Commercial three-ton truck without a cabin or windscreen. We went everywhere on it ... with the back tray swept free of dirt and sitting on a blanket. In the 1950s, we drove to collect our weekly meat order that came by rail-motor from the provincial township of Sarina to our township of Carmila, some 12km (8 miles) distant to the east. We went to monthly dances in Carmila, to Carmila beach, to rodeos and local school functions. It often took up to an hour to drive to Carmila because of the corrugations in the dirt road and creek crossings with loose gravel and slippery banks. If creeks were flooded, few of our neighbouring farmers could get to Carmila for groceries. If the rail-motor from Mackay was held up by water over the line, we could go without meat for a few weeks. About 1955, when the creeks were flooded for quite some time, our model 30k Massey Harris tricycle-fork tractor was rigged up to take a number of large tea boxes and two passengers. One of my brothers drove while another stood holding onto the mud-guard. A friend rode a pole extending from the rear! We got our supplies, but it took the three men nearly all day to make the return journey. When they arrived in Carmila, they had to make room for a neighbour's wife who was stranded after arriving in Carmila by train. Common sense applied then rather than a myriad of safety laws.

Mains electricity came to Carmila around 1962. Before then, some farms had 32 volt DC "lighting plant" generators with large storage batteries. We used kerosene lamps and a kerosene refrigerator that often 'smoked' sending a horrible stink throughout the house. Kero lamps had to be filled nightly and wicks trimmed regularly to maximise their brightness. Letters were written and school work done by their dim, yellowish light. They were extinguished by sudden breezes, especially during a storm.

In the 1950, our stove burned wood that had to be chopped regularly and the wood-box replenished daily. Wood-chips were collected each afternoon for lighting the fire in the morning. Clothes were hand-washed. Very soiled clothing was boiled in a "copper" ... a cylindrical copper vessel suspended on a metal frame under which a wood fire burned. Before we purchased a "boiler", the clothes had to be turned regularly with a poker or "copper" stick to prevent them sticking and burning on the bottom of the copper. The boiler used convection to make hot water flow through the clothes. It comprised a metal dome at its base and a central tube, capped at the top. Water squirted from holes drilled along the tube and from under the cap. It worked really well when the water was very hot or nearly boiling.

Every few days, an engine driven pump on the bank of a nearby gully had to be started to top up the tank whose water was used for everything other than drinking. The engine was a one-cylinder, one hosepower, water cooled, 1910 stationary engine. After priming the centrifugal pump the engine was usually started after much swearing and rapid pulling on the drive belt. Shock-horror for anyone, let alone a young lad, starting an engine in that manner in the 21^st century. It kept us supplied with water that was occasionally tainted a little by our household cows. We also had a rainwater tank that was fed from the roof of our house. Its 1,000 gallon (4,500 litre) capacity was usually sufficient for a year with wise usage and replenishment from the annual wet season and thunderstorms. We drank un-sterilised water, but that is still a common farming practice.

The shower/bath room was under the tank stand, with its share of leaks. Before my father could afford a "chip" heater, we showered with cold water or used water from the copper for nightly bathing. When the chip-heater was installed, rather than light a fire with wood chips, we used pumice stone collected from the beach and soaked in kerosene. It served us well, particularly when men came home after a long hard, day cutting cane and covered in sticky, black juice. It was common practice to throw more kerosene on the dwindling flames to have a little longer shower - often the heater almost blew apart as the kero vaporised and caught fire!

Chooks had to be fed and put to bed each night, and eggs collected. Sometimes we would spend hours following turkeys moving in devious ways to throw us off finding their nests. There were times we thought we would have a brood of turkey chicks only to discover a dingo or dog had eaten everything. Turkey chicks were fragile and relatively few survived the first couple of months. They seemed to smother under the mother at night, drown in the moist grass or get caught up in the grass and choke. Carpet snakes accounted for many losses from the fowl house. However greedy ones were usually caught when they couldn't get through wire netting on their departure. Life on the farm was not easy, but it was a good apprenticeship of life.

We had little money but were generally self-sufficient growing our own vegetables in a small paddock of rich soil beside a creek. The garden was a half-hour walk from our home, and easily seen from the roadway, but we rarely lost vegetables through pilfering. People then had respect for others' property. Everything had to be watered three times each week with water carried in dozens of two-gallon (9 litre) bucket loads from the creek.

Our "wireless", or radio, was a luxury item. Until the Whitlam Government came to power in 1972, everyone had to have a listener's licence for each radio and TV set! The radio was a Philips 5-valve set powered by large "A" (1.5 volt for heaters) and "B" (2 x 45 volt for high tension) batteries. The batteries were relatively expensive and lasted about nine months. They cost about three Australian pounds a set (AUD $6.00) ... about a week's wages for a labourer. It was almost a crime to leave the radio on and unattended.

The radio needed a long wire aerial to "pull in" the local Mackay stations, about 60 miles (100km) over the mountains. It was usually switched onto the local "ABC" national station, 4QA, in Mackay, for the news each lunchtime and evening. Woe betide anyone who made a noise when dad was listening to the news. Reception was often poor or distorted due to phase cancellation from different path lengths the radio waves travelled via surface wave and the ionosphere. There were frequent and hurried attempts to tune to another station if reception was poor and the news was very important.

If reception was reasonable in the daytime, mum listened to 4MK, Mackay's commercial station, while she was ironing. Each working day, "Dr. Paul" came on at 10 a.m. with a comment that the Commonwealth Bank would soon be open. Who would use those irons today? I cannot remember much use being made of solid irons that were heated on the top of a stove. My mother used irons powered by either shellite (white spirits) or petrol. They were potential bombs! They often burst into flames when the burner jet became blocked, and were quickly thrown out into the yard.

"Blue Hills" was a popular radio serial at lunchtime that lasted for many years. My parents didn't listen to it, choosing instead to have a nap or siesta after lunch. In 1999, 4MK moved from the AM band to become 4MK-FM. The original station, built by a local named Jack Williams, went on air in the early 1930s. It was one of the earliest country radio stations in Australia. Williams is long departed. The house from where he started broadcasting at the corner of Nelson and Shakespeare Streets was demolished in 2002.

If my daily chores were done, I could listen to serials and plays meant for young lads and teenagers. 'Dad and Dave', a radio adaptation of Steele Rudd's "On the farm" from the 1930's about country bumpkins was popular family entertainment each week night. Aussie icons, like 'Greenbottles' about schoolboys' antics and 'Smoky Dawson' - a cowboy with an Australian flavour - were popular. Later at night there were dramatised police stories about serious crimes that were often scary. 'Police File' or CIB were not the wisest shows to listen to before going out in the dark to the "back yard dunny" to the "thunderbox" (toilet). I liked another cowboy serial, "Kid Grayson rides the range", because I could identify with the characters around the farm running up and down hills as I rounded up the cows each evening.

We listened to 4MK for funeral announcements at 6 p.m. and 7 a.m. I well remember three occasions when my mother broke down and cried ... on hearing the funeral of her sister's 19 year old son, Reg Ollett. He was a pillion rider on a motorbike that collided with the "Sunlander" passenger train. His father, Charlie, in his early 40s, died not many months afterwards from a stroke. The other was on hearing the funeral of my grand-mother's sister, Nell Lovi. There were others, of course, as my folks, then in their 50s, knew many people from the various communities in which they had lived. These days, I have a similar focus on the "hatched, batched and dispatched" in The Daily Mercury", Mackay's daily newspaper. I sometimes feel that my turn has come to have similar feelings about the passing of my contemporaries.

To travel from Carmila to Mackay to do any shopping, in the 1950s, we had to rise at 5 a.m. to be sure to get to the railway station at Carmila on time to catch the rail motor that departed at 6.30 a.m. There were no security checks other than the stationmaster making sure everyone had a ticket to ride - it just took so long to drive over the rough country roads. The rail-motor was scheduled to arrive at Mackay station at "twenty to ten" (9.40 a.m.) and leave again at "twenty to three" (2.40 p.m.). It was often late arriving in Mackay because it had the lowest priority on the line: often waiting for long periods in loops for trains travelling in the opposite direction to pass. There wasn't much time for country folk to do any shopping unless they caught the "290" goods train. It left Mackay at 6.00 p.m. and arrived at Carmila around midnight. Few people had telephones, so if a passenger didn't arrive on the rail-motor, the person waiting for a passenger had to hang around for about five more hours to see if they arrived on the 290.

Despite the hardships, including walking 2 1/2 miles (5km) to and from school each day, it did me no harm. Our neighbours had similar lifestyles, so we knew no different. Life was a little easier when I went to board with my brother in 1960-61 to attend Mackay State High School. I didn't realise until much later in life how hard my parents had to work so I could attend high school. In the 1990s I spent my savings for my daughter to complete a teaching degree.

Having attended a very small country school with about 20 students, my first day at high school was terrifying. Of the 300 or so kids, as first I didn't know a soul. Like other country kids, I was asked lots of questions about what course I wanted to take. I recall being asked about taking French … anything, except French! It came down to "industrial". Seven subjects: English, two types of Maths, physics and chemistry, two types of industrial drawing, woodwork and metalwork. I liked science and the subjects that developed hand skills, but I wasn't a brilliant student in anything despite hovering around 5-6 in a class of 40. My brilliant achievement was once achieving 100% in geometry and trigonometry - but that was mostly due to the terror induced by the teacher who walloped kids who couldn't explain their homework.

I started tinkering with radio and electrical gadgets when I was about eight or nine, and successfully built my first one-valve radio at about 10 years of age. While city kids could use "crystal sets", we lived too far from the radio station for them to work. I recently picked up a small tuning capacitor that reminded me of the "Roblan" two-gang tuning capacitor I had used in that radio. My mother had bought it for one pound (AUD $2.00) - a great sacrifice, I'm sure, but I rarely asked for presents as I felt embarrassed to receive something I hadn't earned. I still dislike receiving gifts.

I had my bed wired for light using batteries and stiff, bent wire holding the lamp globes. I suffered from hay fever and bronchitis that doctors referred to by many terms … a rose by any name smells the same … and my electric lights were a help to my mother giving me doses of foul medicine of dubious benefit. I progressed to switches of twisted wires after I had learned how to solder. Years later, I discovered I was allergic to paw-paws that we perennially grew about the house, but out-grew the problem with maturity.

I had a lot of burned fingers in my radio construction projects. I used pieces of sheet aluminium for radio chassis that were easy to bend, and had been taught how to solder with an iron heated in the fire or held above a kerosene powered blow-lamp. No one told me you couldn't solder to aluminium, but I eventually overcame that with screws. I was fortunate to gather pieces of old radios and telephones, "flat" battery sets from neighbours, and the occasional coil of copper wire with which to build my electrical gadgets from an apprentice electrician who became my brother-in-law.

In the mid- to late-1950s, Queensland's Bush Childrens' library provided the background knowledge for my radio and eletrcicial interest, as did an old Encyclopaedia at our school. There were many things I could not understand about AC, DC and transformers that often resulted in burned fingers. My primary power source was a six volt tractor battery that often fused the wires I was holding in my fingers trying to learn the finer points of motors and transformers. Many of my contemporaries thought me a little unusual, but I found comfort in discussing such things with a much older friend who was on the same wavelength and who had built more advanced radios. My playmates found it hard to believe I could build (crude) loudspeakers and other things needed to make my radios work, but they never came to my place to see for themselves.

In my readings of a torn and tattered 1930-era Encyclopaedia Britannica about radios, I learned a principal that has been part of my philosophy ever since ... no matter how clever you are, you will never succeed without patience. In the late 1990s, I learned the father of one of my sisters-in-law had donated the book. Wherever your spirit may be, Jack Rosenbaum, you left a legacy I live by.

At the age of 15 1/2 years and two years of high school (end of year 10 these days), I enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) as a radio apprentice. I saw this as being my only opportunity to learn what I needed to know about radio.

Working on the farm had its good points, but I wasn't cut out to be a farmer. My dad also realised that. Despite my age, my parents didn't object to my joining the air force. Life in the air force came as a shock in a number of ways. I wasn't accustomed to wearing footwear for long periods, or having my body subjected to physical contortions akin to torture. I was designed to have my two feet on the ground and being downside-up didn't augur too well with me. Rifle drill was hard on my small frame, and I often finished with bruised shoulders. They were also bruised after a session rifle range, but I didn't mind that. After all, I had been shooting on the farm from the age of 10. Although I felt the kick and the loud report from the centre fire ".303" rifle, that didn't concern me greatly.

I also had to learn how to iron and starch summer uniforms ... long sleeved "drab" cotton shirts and long trousers. Also, winter uniform blue shirts with removable collars. I lost much sleep getting up early to have creaseless uniforms to wear on parade. I don't iron many clothes these days, but it now seems easy! I often reflect in middle-age ... if I survived the rigours of military training, and accepted and enforced discipline for 20 years, almost anyone can.

In the mid-1990s, aged in my late 40s, when working at a private college, I found my air force days set me in good standing during "camp week". It was a hard going, but I kept up with 15 year old pubescent adolescents for a week of 20 km hikes each day across hot and dry country. I also carried a 21kg (45lb) pack plus seven litres (1.5 gallons) of water.

At the end of my air force apprenticeship and general service training, I was posted to Darwin, Northern Territory. My father wished I had been posted closer to home, but told me he knew no one influential to arrange that. While I enjoyed my time in Darwin, from the time I enlisted in 1962 until dad died in mid-1968, I saw my parents on few occasions. He suffered a heart attack in his mid-50s at a time when open-heart surgery was either unknown or uncommon. Six months before his death, in August 1968, he told me he attributed his heart attack on the pesticide "245T". This incredible assertion preceded by many years similar allegations of deaths due to "agent orange" in Vietnam.

Less than a year after my father died, on 20th June 1969, I was posted to Vietnam to serve with the RAAF No. 2 Canberra bomber squadron. I completed a 12-month tour on 20th June 1970. The squadron operated as part of the USAF 35th Tactical Fighter Wing at Phan Rang Air Base, some 170 miles on the coast northwards of Saigon. It was a long year, but most of us got on well. I kept in touch with a few fellow veterans for many years, and enjoyed attending reunions, but it's become harder to keep in touch as years go by. Vietnam has left a few scars, but I am one of a shrinking number of veterans not classified as a TPI pensioner (Temporary and Permanently Incapacitated).

The "Home of 2 Squadron" in Vietnam was on the same base where USAF C-123 "Provider" transport aircraft took part in "Operation Ranch Hand" spraying large parts of the country with a host of herbicides ... Agents Blue, Green, Purple ... Orange. A dozen or so years later, fellow Veterans began to succumb from exposure to Agent Orange whose major constituent was 245T.

I also keep in touch with ex-apprentice mates ... we had a relatively tough time for 2 1/2 years of trade and military training. In that time, we developed a very close brotherhood that has endured for 40 years. In May 2003, 20 of us gathered in Brisbane for a few days. Some hadn't seen each other for 39 years, yet it seemed only a week. Our voices hadn't changed although our hairstyles had. Most were anxious to learn about "squeak" who went AWOL from his Woomera posting, around late 1964. He gave himself up after almost a year on the run, was court-martialled, and served a prison sentence of 30 days. A small price, he said, for leaving the air force.

I had a successful and generally satisfying 20 year air force career as a technician, supervisor, instructor and communications engineer. I rose through the ranks to the highest NCO rank of Warrant Officer (E-9, CMS equivalent in the US military) before returning to civilian life, in 1982.

My qualifications include radio and electronics gained at a technical college during my air force apprenticeship. As a mature age student over many years I obtained tertiary qualifications in technical photography, computing, and teaching. The RAAF later upgraded my qualifications for communications engineering and teaching based on work experience. Nothing fancy … they built some self-esteem and helped to gain employment.

From 1982-99, I was a part-time photo-finish operator at greyhound (dogs), harness racing (trots) and turf (gallops) in Mackay. Unlike conventional photographic images that capture a large area of space in an instant of time, photo-finish images record events in a very small area of the finish line over a relatively long period of time. Film-based photo-finish cameras were an adaptation of the "streak" camera originally developed to measure the rate of explosive detonation. An Australian first adapted the streak camera for photo-finish, in the 1930s. Instead of a shutter, film moved at a constant speed across a narrow slit "painting a picture" of moving objects in focus. The image of stationary objects or those moving much slower than the combination of film-speed and lens magnification (film-speed and focal length) are "streaked out". When set to capture races, only competitors produce a clear image. Grass, for instance, is recorded as a series of different shaded lines (streaks) across the film. The approximate speeds across the finish line are - dogs and gallops 60kph (45 mph), trots 40 kph (25 mph).

A photo-finish operator performed under considerable pressure. Knowledge, quick thinking, speed and precision were needed to produce timely and accurate results. Manual dexterity ability and knowledge of photography and processing chemistry were required to load/unload a camera in total darkness and to process the film by hand in a matter of seconds. An electronic timer triggered by the gate/box as competitors left the starting point gave the race time. A few lengths (5 - 10 metres) before the finish post, we started the camera. A strip of 120 film was dragged across the film plane to capture the animals as they went across the finish line. Immediately after the last dog or horse crossed the finish line, the film was removed from the camera and tray-processed in developer, stop, and fixer baths. Processing took less than 30 seconds. Results were then visually assessed and presented to the judge within about two minutes of the race finishing. Greyhound results were read to the judge over an intercom. Horse racing judges saw the film images on closed circuit television. Depending on the margins of the leading animals, "developed" prints were made on paper for the judge's close examination. Regardless of the race-track, a significant error or misdemeanour could threaten the global integrity of the photo-finish system.

Few acknowledge the responsibility borne by a photo-finish operator. While the judge's decision is final, few would dare post a close result without a photo-finish backup. A court battle ensued in the 1980s after two punters claimed they lost a large sum of money because the judge posted official results that were later found to differ from the photo-finish image. They challenged the judge's decision being final after "correct weight" is given and the judge posts an incorrect result. In 1997, the film-based photo-finish systems I worked with were replaced by a computer based system. It took hundreds of small picture slices of the finish line and assembled them into a composite picture on the computer screen as soon as the race finished to give a result similar to films. Computer systems don't use corrosive chemicals, record the precise time a race competitor crosses the track, and have the ability for the judge to enlarge or peruse the result. After ensuring a smooth transition, I retired to take advantage of public holidays and Saturday afternoons like I had given up for others' pleasure with relatively little remuneration for more than 17 years.

Having "grown up" in the air force, I have never completely come to terms with being a civilian. Being an honorary historian for a local veterans' organisation has satisfied some of my alter ego. From 1995 to 2002, I wrote and produced a local veterans' newsletter before it became a quarterly to give me some respite.

In 1992 I became involved with a memorial to 41 American servicemen aboard a warplane that crashed near Mackay, Queensland. This recently led to my being invited and hosted on a 15-day US Memorial Tour across the USA in September-October 2003.

I am a member of The Australia Defence Association that lobbies for better defence of Australia. Chatting by e-mail with other veterans around the world is one of my hobbies, though it is often interlaced with other extra-curricular activities, about which this site shows some samples.

Col Benson

Mackay, Down Under