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Women in the AWLA were commonly referred to as ’land girls’. The AWLA comprised young women who volunteered to work as rural labour to offset the labour shortage on farms created by men leaving to either join the armed services or take up essential war work during World War II. Female recruits had to be British subjects and between the ages of 16 and 50 years. AWLA was largely made up of women from city areas who had little knowledge of rural life. The AWLA recruits initially faced reluctance and scepticism from the farming community. However, after formal farm training, the women valiantly took on exhausting dawn-to-dusk work, eventually earning great respect from the farmers they assisted. The women of the AWLA took on hard physical farm work such as animal raising, sheep and wool work, ploughing fields and crop work. This back-breaking work was often performed in adverse conditions and they were paid much less than their male counterparts. The average working week for an AWLA member was in excess of 48 hours. The AWLA was a voluntary group and not an enlisted service. Although the organisation was to be officially constituted under the National Security Regulations, this was not completed before the end of the war. Therefore, women of the land army were not officially accorded the same rights and benefits of other women’s services. Until 1985, AWLA members were denied the opportunity to march on ANZAC day. In recognition of their considerable war contribution, AWLA members became eligible for the Civilian Service Medal in 1995, which recognises the service of eligible civilians who served in arduous circumstances in support of the WWII effort. Source: www.centenaryofanzac.tas.gov.au/history/women_and_war/wom...

A bullocky is an Australian English term for the driver of a bullock team. The American term is bullwhacker. Bullock drivers were also known as teamsters or carriers. Prior to the gold rushes in Australia, in the mid-19th century, bullock drays carried essential food and station supplies to isolated country areas. On return trips, they transported wheat, wool, sugar cane, and timber by drays drawn by teams of draught animals (either bullocks or horses) to shipping ports before the advent of rail. They travelled constantly across the landscape, servicing the pastoral stations and settlements far from regional transport hubs and urban centers. Some of the larger stations maintained their own teams for local use when harvesting and transporting wool. Both bullock and horse wagons carried heavy loads of wool and wheat which was the main produce transported over long distances, plus chaff and hay. A bullock wagon could only travel approximately three miles an hour (depending on the load and terrain) therefore it was slower than a horse team. Bullock drivers were typically skilled tough men who often faced extreme difficulties during their job. Bullockies were also colorful characters, often noted for their strong language. Some did not swear though, relying solely on gesture, talking, and whip movements as persuasion for the team’s job at hand. A typical bullocky wore a cabbage tree hat, a twill shirt of that period, moleskin trousers, and blucher boots, and carried a long bullock whip which in many instances he had made. During the early years, the bullock tracks were very rough with narrow, steep "pinches", plus dangerous river and creek crossings. Many roads still follow the tracks made by bullock teams as they negotiated their way up or down hills via a winding course to make haulage easier. Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullocky

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