Hubert Opperman - The Human Motor

For Hubert Opperman’s 1937 transcontinental record attempt, Perth motoring personality Aub Melrose was taken on board as mechanic, driver and navigator. Aub was a charismatic character with many talents and enthusiasms, among them photography.
The photos below were discovered in Aub’s tins of negatives, now with his grandson Tony. They are in the form of three processed, but uncut, rolls of black and white film. The uncut nature suggests that they have never before been printed .

Oppy was Malvern Star proprietor Bruce Smalls’ central marketing asset. This brochure would have been distributed by Malvern Star dealerships across the nation. The timed stops of the 1934 record, held by Billy Read, were listed, with an empty column on the right. The public were encouraged to follow Oppy’s progress on the wireless, and fill in his times in the blank space.