History

Hannaford's is a family owned company that has been running for more than 50 years.

Jack Hannaford

The Early Years

And if only Jack could see now the way the Bus & Coach industry has grown, I suppose when you think about it, just about every walk of life would be in the fast lane.

The late Mr Jack Hannaford worked with his father Cyril Burgess Hannaford on a farm in the small village of Westdale situated on the western outskirts of Tamworth. The farm consisted mainly of milking cows. With horse-drawn wagons, he and his sister Beryl would deliver milk to many homes of Tamworth. Deliveries on the north side of town included Janison Street. It was here he met his future wife Jean Prince.

Through the courting years he played cricket and worked on the farm and his means of transport was horse. On the odd occasion, Jack and Jean would go to the pictures, sit in peanut ally paying sixpence each and, with the very little money left, would buy an ice cream.

Married Life

In 1940, Jack and Jean were married and lived in Denison Street, West Tamworth, with Jean's sister Heather. Jack continued working with his father on the farm - making hay and milking.

They decided to seek work in Newcastle. Jack worked as a fitter's labourer at BHP. They stayed in a flat in Mayfield for a while before moving to Hamilton. Whilst working for BHP, Jack was called up for service in the Light Horse.

Jack became very interested in the delivery of newspapers and won a tender to deliver the Sydney papers in and around the North and Northwest. Some sort of vehicle was needed.

The Begining of the Bus Service

In the year of 1952 the late Mr Jack Hannaford and wife Jean commenced a passenger bus service from the Tamworth City to the Airport which was then situated in Taminda. The 1948 OB Bedford bus (left) was the first bus purchased by Hannaford's. Having very little money, and cars and utes being few and far between, Jack helped himself to his father's ute, which was ideal. However, Cyril found out - that ute did only one run!

As the city grew, so did the Hannaford story, with the purchase of the Winton School Bus Service and starting the Bective School Service. Fresh from being painted, the first four buses of the fleet (left) are ready to do the rounds.

Jack also contracted a service for East West Airlines conveying pilots and hostesses to and from the city to the airport, returning mishandled luggage and taking passengers to Armidale when the weather was too bad at Armidale Airport for planes to land.

Hannaford's Today

The family name still carries on with some 20 vehicles in the fleet. Three of these vehicles are coaches which are used to conduct tours Australia wide. Hannaford's are innovative. Regular tours run to popular destinations throughout Australia, including out of the way places. International and domestic group tours to most places in NSW and Queensland are a specialty. Recently, they have teamed up with Fred Hillier, author of books "Down the Back" and " Further down the Back".

In the Non-Commercial & Commercial bus line side over the past 10 years, Hannafords have introduced Cummins motors in conjunction with Auto Bus Body build by Kevin Johnson in Brisbane. The last couple of experiments in repositioning the radiator to in front of the right hand side rear wheel has proven to be beneficial due to the gravel/dusty roads they travel. The result was less wear and tear on belts and radiator which were exposed to the rear wheels.