Tom Cromack

Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame in 2018.

Tom Crowbar Cromack first started in the transport industry in the early 70's driving for Doug James. His first trip was in a Butter Box International ACCO carting grain around the Finley area until he bought his own truck a 1418 Mercedes Benz doing Interstate Haulage carting general freight.

He then upgraded to a 1418 High Torque Convention Cab Mercedes Benz. The first thing he did was pull the gear box out and put a 10 speed road ranger and a pusher axel to enable him to carry more weight. He travelled all over Australia carting freight from Melbourne to all capital cities including Darwin. These were pretty long trips as the top speed for the Mercedes were 58 mile and hour. One particular trip carting cabbages from QLD to Sydney Tom ended up rolled over on the Putty Rd coming off 2nd best after near colliding with a coal truck. There were cabbages for miles and miles.

The next upgrade was a 2224 Benz. This was total luxury as it had 240HP with a sleeper cab. No more bending over the steering wheel or sleeping on the seats. With many a mechanical problem though he finally decided to buy a White Road Commander with a Cummins VT 903 carting local grain to Geelong. Like most self employed in the transport industry Tom spent most of his time behind the wheel and spare time was spent maintaining whilst trying to raise a family of 6 with his beloved wife Maureen.

In the early 1980's Tom purchased a blue and white Mack R600. He was still carting grain until it went quiet and then went back to carting general freight from Melbourne to Brisbane. Around the mid 80's was when he started his relationship with Coffs Harbour Hardwood. He would cart telephone poles and various timbers some of which built the upgrade to the Geelong jetty and the station pier in Port Melbourne for the Spirit of Tasmania. Although upgrading to several different trucks along the way with his last one being a Freightliner 112.

his relationship with Coffs Harbour Hardwood would remain strong until his retirement, even driving their trucks for his final years until he finally retired at 70 in 2011.