Ken Cobbin

Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame at ReUnion 2015.

Ken Cobbin was born in Gympie Queensland on the 25th June 1937. After leaving school he tried his hand at working in a cordial factory, cane and timber cutting before he found his niche, driving semi-trailers for O'Connor & Son at Kilcoy in 1962. Ken started driving an old White taking frozen food from Brisbane to Darwin. He often had to go the long way around Australia, up to Alice Springs then onto Darwin, often with two drivers. Ken soon moved onto driving Mercedes trucks, still carting frozen food. He was one of the first truckers into Darwin after Cyclone Tracy. He had to have a special certificate to allow him in.

Ken did trips to Cairns, Townsville and Mt Isa with a few trips to McArthur River for meat. He worked for O'Connor & Son for 15 years, leaving in 1976. In the same year Ken married Carrol and on the 19th January he started driving for George Teichmann taking log billets to Brimms Particle Board in Brisbane, doing two loads a day. He started delivering log butts into Brimms, Brisbane as well as most times doing two trips a day from Benarkin to Brisbane.

Ken retired in December after 27 years driving. In 2004 Ken and Carrol began caravanning around Australia, which they both enjoyed.

Ken passed away in August 2014 survived by Carrol, son Kenneth Glen, daughter-in-law Amanda and grandson Izaac. As a footnote, Ken gave up smoking when Benson & Hedges went up to 50 cents a packet.