A BHP mail-room boy and shipping clerk remembers
When Neville Chant started work as a clerk at the BHP Company's Newcastle steelworks in 1936, he was allocated to the correspondence department as a mail-room boy. He'd just finished his school leaving certificate and he started at the BHP just before Christmas. It was a different world from that of 2021, but although communications technology might seem primitive compared to today's, it was capable of great efficiency. While BHP's headquarters were in Melbourne, it had important interests in many parts of Australia. The BHP steelworks and its satellite industries were a huge presence in Newcastle,…