After the inaugural article of the “Americans Down Under” series, I am gleefully taking a temporary detour from that premise. In researching for the Ford edition I stumbled upon the epic voyage of Francis Birtles. He was an adventurer for the ages and one of his pioneering journeys heavily involved a Ford Model T. His story needs to be told here before returning to envisioned Australian fare.
Isn’t the beauty of research allowing oneself to become distracted by diving down a rathole when a bigger story presents itself?
Francis Birtles was born in Fitzroy, Victoria, in 1881, the third child of an English boot maker and his wife. Birtles embraced his adventuresome streak at an early age, joining the merchant marines at age 15 and later doing a stint as a soldier in Australia’s irregular mounted infantry.
By 1905 he was back in Australia after spending time in South Africa. In December of that year Birtles left Fremantle, Western Australia, to ride a bicycle to Melbourne. He would be the first person to successfully make this trip.
Later, he would be the first person to bicycle from Fremantle to Sydney, currently a driving distance of nearly 4,000 kilometers.
Birtles is not featured in this photo
In 1912 Birtles gave his bicycle a reprieve for a 20 horsepower Flanders similar to this one. Birtles, his bulldog, and his brother Clive would drive the Flanders from Melbourne to Sydney and then to the Gulf of Carpentaria. This trip took the Birtles Brothers close to the border with the Northern Territory before returning to Melbourne.
As an aside, the Flanders was based in Detroit and produced from 1910 to 1913. It was founded by Walter Flanders who had previously been a plant manager at Ford Motor Company.
The year 1913 is when Birtles would use a brand new Ford Model T to make a 3,500 mile automobile journey from the Gulf of Carpentaria to Port Phillip Bay, a southbound journey covering Queensland and New South Wales. Birtles kept a diary of his trip and Ford Motor Company used excerpts in their various literature in 1915.
Birtles with catch, year unknown
It is nicely detailed and gives the reader a unique insight into the gritty reality that was Australia in the early 20th Century. Let’s see what Birtles experienced. This journey was not a quick one but is very captivating. Click on the pictures to make it larger for easier reading.
Of note is Birtles’ living off the land, shooting a crocodile through the eye with a 0.22 caliber rifle, and his Model T’s use of benzene.
Bear in mind this was written from the perspective of someone from the early 20th Century. Odds are quite high some of his descriptors likely would not be so readily used in contemporary times.
Naturally, the trip was successful for both Birtles and Ford. Birtles’ account of the trip, while not overly focussed on the Model T, serves as profound testimony of the brutality of the Australian wild combined with the flawless operations of his Ford.
Birtles would continue with his automotive adventures. In 1927 he drove from London to Australia via the Continent, Egypt, India, and Burma before arriving in Australia. By this point in time Birtles had traversed Australia a total of 70 times.
For his Darwin to Adelaide adventure in 1924, Birtles used an Oldsmobile
His adventures were recorded in several books, such as 3,500 Across Australia in a Ford Car in 1915 and Darwin to Adelaide in 9 Days, 9 Hours, 15 Minutes in 1924. Birtles also made five films about his travels.
For his unnerving and seemingly ceaseless adventures, Birtles has earned some additional recognition a century later.
Mr. and Mrs. Birtles, 1935
“Of note is Birtles’ . . . Model T’s use of benzene.”
This might be a linguistic issue, not a fuel choice issue. In some languages, “benzene” (and spelling variants) is the word for “gasoline”. Germans put “benzin” in their cars, for example.
And in the early days of motoring, all sorts of terms were very fluid with plenty of regional differences. A quick Google search tells me that “benzene” was used interchangeably with “petrol” in New Zealand, in the early years.
With its manual spark advance, a Model T might run just swell on straight benzene – it has better anti-knock abilities. It may have been the only fuel available in some remote places in Australia. But it is entirely possible that “benzene” was just another word for petrol/gasoline in that time and place.
That crossed my mind also but then my mind also went back to the T’s ability to burn about anything.
The big thing to me was wondering how much he had to carry since fuel stations weren’t exactly a frequent occasion for him.
My grandmother always talked of filling her car with Benzine ie petrol she was of the same era as Birtles.
Wonderful post. Like many a pioneer, in any endeavor, Birtles was clearly as mad as he was brave. Mad as a cut snake, as we say.
His diary writings are full of a dry, often self-deprecating Australian humour that was once universal but fading a bit in the internet of now. Love his descriptions of the dog when he stole his only pants, (and of his sympathy for the curr when he got sick too), and love the “mixed bathing” net he walked into on the Gulf, most of which could’ve killed him.
I have been to many of the locations here over the years and CCérs can rest assured, you venture one mile from the main roads (not all made) in Australia’s great north and the conditions are exactly the same today. There is much variety of landscape, and it is often stunning in its own fashion, but there are great stretches under immense heat without obvious water. Mind, there IS water, as 40,000 years of aboriginal occupation proves, just not apparent to the more recent comers. It’s interesting that he has black people in his photos, as there is no indication of any fondness or admiration for them, which many other explorers expressed.
I did laugh at the description of racing an English “thousand pound” car and winning with his T to the other’s surprise, partly because of the risk it represented at the end of a long, long way, but mainly because the English lack of understanding that those cursed trans-Atlantic colonials built cars better suited than they could was never really accepted.
That said, I suspect our Mr Birtles was a bit of a chancer, or at least, liked to give the truth a good polishing. As an example, rest assured, an emu can move at quite a pace, but not 50mph. And thus I suspect Mr B was most grateful for the use of that there Ford, and having been on the much-improved roads that way since and still broken things, I have reason to reckon that the assertion the T need no repairs whatsoever might be a personal Return of gratitude – or PR.
I had been curious about your take on this century old adventure.
Birtles did some PR trips later on, one for a tire manufacturer. If nothing else the man certainly knew how to live.
I commented, could someone retrieve it please?
Done, see above!!!
Fascinating read, Jason. That car was “Built Ford Tough”, that’s for sure.
Apparently, so was he! He catches Malaria and keeps going? Wow.
What I am curious about was how he managed with the fuel. It wasn’t like there was Shell station every so many miles back then (or even now in the outback). I see from reading that he carried fuel tanks with him, so there’s that. And that Model T got some pretty good gas mileage according to his travelogue. But talk about range anxiety venturing off into the unknown like that. Impressive.
Yes, a fascinating read. I admire those old timers who were up to such a task. A couple of thoughts:
First, that Flanders was actually an early product of the Studebaker company. The EMF company had sold through Studebaker wagon dealers, but due to quality complaints Studebaker bought the operation around 1910 and changed the name to Studebaker by 1913. Studebaker/EMF was number 3 in US vehicle production in 1912.
The Model T got a reputation by being a great cheap car, but early in its life it was one of the best cars you could buy at any price. Its capabilities and the quality of its materials were first rate. Had Ford offered similar designs of more size and power he surely would have bested many more expensive cars on their own turf.
The Model T’s light weight and flexible chassis made it an excellent choice for the crude conditions. The car’s simplicity and brute toughness got the job done.
Someone drove a T Ford the length of New Zealand back in the day it didnt hurt sales at all axle deep mud in lots of it, those things went almost anywhere, Ive been a lot of the places Birtles went, some of the roads had improved by then not all.
A largely-forgotten explorer these days, though I remember hearing Dad (b.1909) talking about him in the same breath as “the greats” we learnt about in school. From the number of journeys he made, and the different areas of the outback he crossed, he certainly belongs right up there with Burke and Wills and all the others. He may not have been the first in any of those areas he traversed, but he proved that the car could cope with Aussie conditions.
Probably did a lot to help Model T sales, and car sales in general in country areas, and also to set the old Aussie expectation that any car should be capable of doing all that.
Somewhere I saw a printout of the lyrics to “Along the Road to Gundagai,” and ISTR something about “an old Ford made of rubber, tin, and board,” and further comments on the state of the Ford. I just pulled up a couple of versions of the song on Youtube, but they didn’t have that verse.
That’s from a parody version, we have the version by Mike and Michelle Jackson on a kids comedy tape (old!). Pretty sure it’s not part of the original.