Published

This book was my magnum opus, or to put it another way, it was my Mount Everest, in the sense of what do you do when you have climbed Mount Everest? I had imagined that the story I told in these chapters would be taken up by those who could use the information to fix the mess. For I could see that it was only by having a clear understanding of how we got into the mess that there was any hope of getting out of it. It was a book that deserved a place in the libraries of universities and at all levels of government but the underwhelming reaction was to tell me that no-one cared. It left me despondent, but out of it I have discovered a new force that drives me (READ MY STORY). I have faith that there are people out there who do care. For them I have made the contents of the book freely available.
- JLW

This book is out of print and there is no plan for a reprint. We are proud of what we have produced and have been driven by the need of the public to know. Profit has not been a consideration. We have put the entire content on the website where it may be freely downloaded. The book is copyright, but permission is granted for individual copies to be generated.

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• Imprint Page: All the mandatory data including the copyright statement and contents page 1 and page 2. Permission is freely granted to print individual copies of these files for it is the interests of the future of the nation that only by understanding how this mess occurred that there can be any hope of a better outcome. But that licence does not extend to printing more copies for sale.
• Tim Fischer Pages
• Mission Statement: One of my eccentricities is to add some poetry. I have added the contents page as I acknowledge that in recognition of the depth of research and information in this book and also the fact that it has not been taken up by libraries and accordingly we will be receptive to requests by researchers and writers who wish to have access to other chapters.
• Chapter 1: The track to the centre of the earth. We can’t deal with gauges until we understand track.
• Chapter 2: The cantankerous business of railway curves and their cant. There is much of Des Smith’s wisdom in these pages.
• Chapter 3: The origin of the Irish broad gauge in Australia. This is a long chapter that exonerates Francis Shields, as the culprit and provides convincing evidence that it was Governor General FitzRoy in 1853 who allowed Victoria and NSW to go their separate ways.
• Chapter 4: Fitzgibbon, Fox and the Queensland narrow gauge. I have nothing good to say about Abraham Fitzgibbon.
• Chapter 5: Praise be to the 5 ft 3. How the Irish settled on the best railway gauge and South Australia and Victoria followed.
• Chapter 6: The curse of the North - South transcontinental railway. Part one. South Australia was obsessed with the vision of this railway but it would bring much grief.
• Chapter 7: Robert Fairlie and his double engines. How the cheap and nasty 3 ft 6 in narrow gauge spread.
• Chapter 8: A Portent of doom. Break-of-Gauge at Western Junction in Tasmania and Kadina in South Australia.
• Chapter 9: Crying over spilt milk. Hamley Bridge and Terowie.
• Chapter 10: Bordertown both ways. A monument to bad planning.
• Chapter 11: The train to Montezuma. Railways with gauges of 2 ft and 2 ft 6 in.
• Chapter 12: Nuts and Bolts People. This is the longest chapter in the book and with good reason. For the fathers of Federation had the means to fix the problem but were blinkered by other priorities.
• Chapter 13: BOGS and the train from Spain. BOGS were break of gauge devices. There was an industry that thrived on trucks with axles that slid in and out.
• Chapter 14: The curse of the North-South transcontinental railway. Part 2. Goyder and his line, and Oodnadatta.
• Tabular 14A
• Tabular 14a: A listing of Premiers and Prime Ministers 1900-1919. - available soon
• Chapter 15: Border railways gone wrong. Pinnaroo, Murrayville, Mount Gambier.
• Chapter 16: Lessons about locomotives. Garratts and others.
• Chapter 17: On the defensive. Australia’s railways were not ready for war. When I asked my Federal member, who in the present Government had ownership of the agenda item on the gauge issue his reply was (rather sheepishly) ‘no-one’.
• Chapter 17A: Defence Considerations
• Chapter 18: The curse of the North-South transcontinental railway. Part 3. Hamley Bridge and Terowie.
• Chapter 19: The decade of lost opportunities. The Western System of the SAR.
• Tabular 19a: 1920 - 1978. The disintegration of the South Australian Railways.
• Chapter 20: The prophesy of Santayana and the Clapp Report. The prophesy was that those who failed to learn from the lessons of history were doomed to repeat them.
• Chapter 21: Uncle Tom. The bad side and the good side of Tom Playford.
• Tabular 21A: Playford Tabular
• Chapter 22: Mr Fitch says. Ron Fitch was the last serious Commissioner of the South Australian Railways. His replacement was Murray Stockley whose role was one of acceding to the direction of the State Government.
• Chapter 23: The rise and fall of Australian National Railways.
• Tabular 23a: A listing of Prime Ministers and the rise and fall of Australian Railways. - available soon
• Chapter 24: The Epilogue. The man from Mars and the climb of Everest. - available soon
• APPENDIX A: Des Smith on concrete sleepers. - available soon
• APPENDIX B: The report by Chief Commissioner Eddy.

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