Red Dust Tapes

OVER 55 YEARS AGO multi-award-winning journalist John Francis interviewed ageing Australian Outback characters, before their voices were lost in the red dust. THIS IS UNIQUE Aussie history. NEARLY ALL lived largely solitary lives, in the harsh and lonely inland, on the edge of deserts, in a world of searing droughts, and occasional fierce floods. THEY WERE prospectors, sheep and cattle men, boundary riders, drovers, railway workers, truck drivers, Aboriginal groups, and isolated but hardy women. AUSTRALIA'S AVIATION HISTORY also started in the red dust. You'll hear interviews with some of Australia's most famous pioneer airmen (many of whom started flying in the First World War), who used aircraft to make the Outback a little less lonely. JOHN ALSO interviews the descendants of other unique characters, reads fascinating tales from Australia's Outback past, and spins tales of his own red dust adventures. WEBSITE: www.reddusttapes.au

Red Dust Tapes is a society podcast hosted by John Francis, with 25 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

John Francis hosts Red Dust Tapes, a society show with 25 episodes published.

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  Red Dust Tapes

  Learning to love the nauseating smell of castor oil, when you’re in a leather helmet and goggles, and bouncing about in an open cockpit

  May 9, 20261h 19mS0

  <p>Greetings, Red Dusters. This is the 13th episode of Season Two, so I’m taking a break. But fear not, I have a dilly-bag full of tasty tales that I’ll be working up for Season Three.</p><p>Now … I have a fascinating episode for you. I’ve mentioned before, that Australian aviation rose above the dust and mud, into the cold cold cold blue, to cover mighty distances.</p><p>Many of you will remember Episodes Four, five and six, where I interviewed former World War 1 fighter pilot Sir Norman Brearley, who started Australia’s very first airline, W...

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  Episode #12

  Chuff-chuff-chuffing through the bush

  Apr 26, 202649 minS2

  <p>Red Dust Tapes rocks and rattles back into the early days of Australian rail.</p><p>You’ll hear:</p><p>A 1914 account of the flies, the dust and the mind-numbing isolation, by a man who was right there with pick and shovel for the building of the 1,710 kilometre Nullabor Railway, the Transcontinental.</p><p>We visit the tiny railway settlement of Cook, in the middle of that desolate track, in the later days of diesel. It’s deserted now, but back in 1970 when I recorded there, it had a school, post office, a lock-up, and a handful of hous...

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  Episode #11

  Slow Slogging Over The Horizon And Beyond: Early Australian Transport

  Apr 13, 20261h 4mS2

  <p>I’ll never forget roll-yer-own, coughing, cursing, tell it as it was, Nicholas Tallack. He was a bushman of wide experience, and with a swag of stories for every one of them.</p><p>Nick Tallack was my favourite yarn spinner, and in this episode of Red Dust Tapes Nick will wax lyrical about camels and donkey teams.</p><p>And later, we’ll chuff/clunk/whistle our way at a leisurely pace in the boiler room and wheelhouse of Murray River paddlesteamers, in the jolly good company of stokers and captains, and hear stories of the river in floo...

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  Episode #10

  Our Andy's Gone With Cattle: The story of the Drovers

  Mar 29, 20261h 9mS2

  <p>Hop on your horse, let's go. And be warned: your bottom will be rubbed raw after just one a day in the saddle. And you could be heaving and swaying up there for several months.</p><p>I have some fascinating people to introduce you to. Like the late, legendary Bill Gwydir, who used to drove thousands of cattle thousands of kilometres, through the sweaty monsoonal mud of Queensland, then through the heat and cold and endless sand of South Australia. Bill's stories, of a childhood raised in the saddle, and of horses going blind in sandstorms, are riveting.<...

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  Red Dust Tapes

  They're shouting GOLD all over, Downunder

  Mar 15, 202659 minS0

  <p>In this chapter:</p><p>The convict who tried a ‘fool’s gold’ trick – twice;</p><p>The real gold rushes and the birth of the swaggie;</p><p>The arrival of the Chinese goes off like fireworks, so here comes the White Australia Policy;</p><p>Grog and mayhem on the goldfields;</p><p>Duck for cover! It’s the bushrangers;</p><p>Defiance, death, and Justice – the Eureka Stockade;</p><p>… And to finish, a delightful interview I had with an old bloke who in the late 1890’s used to tramp up through the snow, past the gold mining camp...

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