Victor Meuleman
Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame at Reunion 2013.
Victor (Vic) Meuleman was born 3 May 1954 at Camden NSW. Victor's father was a truck driver for Rural Grain of Bargo in 1964. He also owned two 318 Dodge V8 Petrol Trucks and did furniture removals around the district on weekends. That's when Vic got the bug to drive trucks. Vic was only ten years old when he got behind the wheel of his dad's truck, he would just turn the key off. His first driving job was for Tegels of Bargo in 1978, driving a Dodge 318 V8 petrol doing deliveries of day old chickens, ducks, and turkeys to farms. He pumped petrol into the truck by hand. Vic was there for two years but he wanted to drive bigger trucks and be on the highway.
Vic got a driving job with Cindar Transport of Bargo which his sister, Diane, and brother-in-law, Ron, owned. He would drive either the ACCO 3070 or White Road Commander doing deliveries and pickups from Griffith, Newcastle and Brisbane, for five years. Vic then drove for Terry Adams of Colavale driving a Scania 112 or ACCO 3070, doing general deliveries from Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide for two years. He wanted something different so he drove for George Quinlan of Penrith. That's when he got his first taste of tipper work, driving an LTL from Jugiong to Port Kembla in truck number six for two years until George went bust.
After that he drove for Fred Missingham (The Lost Pig) in an LTL 350 CAT doing deliveries and pickups from Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide. Then Vic drove for John Rumar Transport (JRT) of Bramar, driving either the Scania, LTL, LNT or Sterling Freightliner doing tipper work to and from Sydney, Melbourne and Whyalla carrying anything from general produce including: potatoes, bread, dough and glass.
Vic is currently driving a Freightliner Colorardo and has so far clocked up 21 years with JRT so they gave him and his wife an all expenses paid cruise to Tasmania. Vic's son, Chris, is also a truck driver and other family relatives are also in the transport industry.
Victor is the sort of bloke who would always stop and give anyone a hand if needed. He often says he wouldn't want to do anything else other than driving trucks up and down the highway. He has formed some great mateships and sadly has lost some to this industry. Too date there has been three generations of the Meuleman family driving the highways of Australia.
