Selwyn Watkins

Inducted into the Shell Rimula Wall of Fame at Reunion 2000.

Selwyn Watkins, (Selly to his mates) born in Ipswich QLD in February 1945, started his trucking career driving a Bedford for Doug Rea, carting coal from Rhonda Collieries in Ipswich to the Tennyson Power Station (QLD) in 1967.

He was originally a panel beater but fell in love with the road and chose it as a lifelong career.  He later drove a 1918 Mercedes Benz for Pozzolanic Bulk Carriers before moving to Gladstone to cart cement and fly ash around Mackay, Emerald and Rockhampton.

In 1970 he bought his own truck, a Kenworth named LITTLE ECHO.  Soon after he purchased another and called DIAMENTINA DEVIL and began running between Ipswich and Darwin on a regular basis, as well as to Karumba and Normanton in north QLD to pick up prawns.  After Cyclone Tracy devasted Darwin in 1974, Sel was among the first to arrive with vital food, construction and medical supplies.

In 1981 Sel Watkins retired from long distance driving and worked for a while on a Main Roads Department tipper in Winton, QLD.  He retired there due to ill health in 1985 and passed away just a couple of  years later in 1987.

The respect he gained from his peers and mates lives on through a memorial cairn erected at Crawford Creek Truck Shop in central Queensland.  He is also remembered on the Lights On The Hill Memorial in Gatton, Queensland.