The 2019 Oaklands Truck Show, now in its 11th year, will be held on March 23 and 24
Talk of the 2019 Oaklands Truck Show in New South Wales being canned prompted then committee member Jimmy Beale to appeal to the community and find a way to keep the show running.
“They were going to cancel the show this year, so I appealed to the people in town and we got together to find a way – people jumped in and really came together to help,” Jimmy tells Owner//Driver.
“It’s one of our major influxes for the community here and the money goes into kids’ sports, wheelchair ramps, all those sorts of things the town needs.
“We’d love to see 60 or 70 thousand raised, which will go back into town.
“Now we have 40 people on the committee and 95 percent are from within the transport industry, so if they’re not owners or drivers their wives are working for transport companies,” he says.
Jimmy is now president of the show and says with the new committee, the show looks set to break its previous record of 104 trucks.
“This is the 11th year it’s been running and we’re hoping to break the current 104 truck record … if we get 120 we’d be stoked!
“It’s a new generation of show, with new blood. We’ve got a lot more support, and we’ve had people from as far as Melbourne ring up to sponsor or bring trucks.
“There will be inductees onto an honour board, which has been running since the start. In fact, we’re in the process of looking for sponsors to build a whole new honour board coming into the main street of the town,” he says.
A very special part of the event is the Lights on the Hill ceremony on the Saturday night, dedicated to Wayne ‘Marto’ Martin, who tragically passed way in a truck accident in March of 2016.
“The Lights on the Hill is special to us because Marto was a young 24-year-old driver who had an accident just two days after winning Truck of the Show here at Oaklands,” Jimmy tells us.
“He had a lot of mates and his passing was a big shock to the transport industry – he was such a great bloke.”
Gates open at 8am on Saturday 23rd and punters can look forward to raffles, market stalls, kids events, food and bar, live music from Toucan Rock, as well as guest speaker Brendan ‘Bumper’ Farrell.
“Come on down because it’s a real get together for the industry, a lot us don’t see each other often,” Jimmy says.
“We talk to each other on the phone or radio but this is about coming together and having a beer and relaxing.”
Photography: Tamara Whitsed