Post Office Cable & Wireless Services
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This 1956 GPO Commer Avenger Mk III bus was originally purchased as a means to provide telegraph services for the Australian cricket tour. During the 1960s it was used as a Mobile Telex Demonstration Unit. The coachwork was built by Harrington.
History
Mobile Van for Cricket Telegrams [Post Office Telecommunications Journal Spring 1956]
"The Postmaster General gave a "send-off" on April 26th [1956] to a new mobile telegraph office which will be used this summer to expedite Press reports during the Australian cricket tour.
The van will attend matches and telegrams will be transmitted by high-speed automatic circuits, or teleprinters connected to the automatic switching network, to the Central Telegraph Station, where they will be received as perforated tape which will be fed into the automatic transmitters connected to the oversea circuits.
Built on a Commer chassis, the office was designed by the Telegraph and Engineering branches of the Post Office External Telecommunications Executive and the Engineering Department. Engineers of the Telephone Manager's staff at Brighton installed the wiring in the works (Harrington of Hove) where the van was built. The vehicle is 27 ft. 6 in. long and weighs six tons. The aluminium coach body is finished in Post Office red with gold anodised metal fittings and gold lettering."
Links
Thomas Harrington Coachwork
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