John Cherrie
Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame in 2023.
John Cherrie was born in September 1953 in Lower Hutt Hospital, Wellington New Zealand. John’s love for trucks started when he was a late teenager. His first job was a grease monkey in the Lube Bay, with a company in New Zealand. As he was not 18 he could not legally drive trucks but at least he was maintaining and greasing them. John loved when on the odd occasion he got to move them.
Once John had his licence the diesel soon grabbed him, allowing him to travel many kilometres and make great memories on the highways. He had driven trucks of all sizes in New Zealand but the urge for the big wide-open country of Australia was in him. At 23 John thought he would explore the big outback. What a change considering he had only driven the cold, windy black roads of New Zealand. After experiencing the open roads, the long hauls and the big diesel engines, John was hooked.
Since arriving in Australia John has been driving road trains, B-doubles, triples, quads and pulled fuel tanks while driving Kenworths/Macks/Western Stars/Atkinsons/Eagles and Big Foots (Kenworth C500s) in the coal mines. John drove many routes and worked for a few big companies hauling anything from bags of seeds, food supplies to remote places as well as dongas and farm machinery.
In the late 1970s John drove many different routes carting whatever supplies were needed for remote communities – from Brisbane, Darwin, Sydney, Melbourne.
John thoroughly enjoyed the trip from Brisbane all the way through Quilpie to Eramanga, Queensland in the early 1980s. He was delivering the first dongas and food supplies for an oil rig camp. After they struck oil John delivered the tanks. Wet season was interesting as the roads were a mixture of bull dust and black soil which became sink holes. The dry season was just as interesting and the bloody flies were unbelievable!!
In the mid-1980s John started driving log trucks for many years before relocating north with his family. John is married to Beryl Cherrie and they have five children. Theodore, Queensland has been home for the past 30 years and is where John successfully started a freight business in 1995. John continues driving to this day, sitting behind the wheel of his Kenworth T600. Lenard, John’s youngest son is now the owner/operator of the business and does most of the long hauls.
One of John’s favourite memories was getting to seeing Lake Eyre from above – thanks to a ride in a helicopter. John had many adventures such as becoming bogged to the axles in a Mack Superliner while pulling a road train. He had to spend the night on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. John always said “Macks were built for the outback roads of Aus.”
After 52 years of loving his job the decision to retire has been extremely hard, but at the end of this year John, when he turns 70, will settle for 2 x 375 Cat engines underneath his 42-foot boat.
