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From: "Dawn Webb" <>
Subject: RE: Castlemaine and Victorian Stage Coach Co. - fares
Date: Sun, 13 Mar 2005 21:20:32 +1100
In-Reply-To: <021c01c52779$7adc9650$0100000a@thomas377142dd>


If I am remembering correctly there was a depression and crash in the
1890s (world wide????) - and I think a lot of wages went way way
backwards then. And took perhaps 60 years to catch up again - and of
course there was the depression of the 1930s we have all heard about.

But yes, things are much cheaper now for telephones, fares etc in terms
of proportion of your weekly wage.

Regards

Dawn

-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Thomas [mailto:]
Sent: Sunday, 13 March 2005 2:05 PM
To:
Subject: RE: Castlemaine and Victorian Stage Coach Co. - fares



It is interesting to compare the fares for coach & train travel, below,
with some other economic indicators:

Telegraph from Melbourne to London, via recently-completed Overland
Telegraph, 1872: 10/6 per word Visit to Doctor, 1907: 10/6 Basic Wage,
1907: 42 shillings, for a six-day working week - as established by
Justice HIGGINS in the Commonwealth Court of Concilition and Arbitration
in his judgement, in "the Harvester Case". WW1 British private soldier:
one shilling per day, of which 6d was
"deferred"*
WW1 Australian soldier: six shillings per day, of which one shilling
was deferred*; this equals 42 shillings per week - same as the 1907
standard. This rate of pay might have prevailed in the early days of
WW2, if my reading of history is correct.
"deferred: to be paid after the war.

All of which makes some of the fares from the 1850s seem quite
significant. Or, it may imply how wealthy the gold-rush made some
people.


Peter THOMAS
Darwin, AUSTRALIA
<>



-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Listerman [mailto:]
Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2005 5:24 PM
To:
Subject: Castlemaine and Victorian Stage Coach Co.


... What perhaps is also of general interest is that the rail line from

Melbourne to Sandhurst (Bendigo) was opened to Sunbury on February 10,
1859,
and passenger traffic to Sunbury commenced with three trains a day each
way,
first class fare 7/6, return 11/6 second, 5/6, return 8/6. Passengers
for/from points north changed to/from coaches at Digger's (sic) Rest,
which
cut an hour and a half off the previous full coach trip into Melbourne.
( I
don't know if Digger's Rest had a rail service before the line reached
Sunbury). The above coach businesses advertised in the Tarrengower
Times
that their coach journeys included either a first or second class rail
ticket, depending on which coach they got on/into. Fares ranged, for
Castlemaine, from 12/6 for the 6am coach and a second class rail ticket
to
2/2/6 for the 8.30 pm coach with a first class rail ticket (did you get
to
lie down?) and from Maldon 1/12/6 first and 1/10/0 second - no times
specified.

Cheers, Tom

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