In the late 1970s, the must-have gadget in every forest office could be best characterised by the fax machine. Millions of people bought them because they represented a miracle. With a fax machine, you could send a sheet of paper to someone, anywhere in the country, or anywhere in the world, complete with a signature, in seconds. E-mail really didn't exist yet (except in military and university environments), so the fax machine was simply amazing. During the "golden age" of the fax machine, people faxed everything. Office lunch orders went to the local Chinese takeaway by fax rather than being phoned in, while fire maps, timesheets and other urgent documents, could all be sent out straight away. Nearly every legal document got faxed once it was signed. People also traded recipes, jokes, funny pictures and personal letters by fax rather than sending them in the snail mail. With the early machines, the output was printed onto a roll of thermal paper that regularly spewed out coils onto the floor if you weren’t watching. All this technology quickly faded, only to be superceded by the pervasive e-mail in the 1990s. But the humble fax machine gave us an early glimpse of what the office of the future would be like.Facsimile machinePitney Bowes 8050communications, forests commission victoria (fcv)

This telephone directory of 1969 has entries from the Camperdown, Casterton, Colac, Edenhope, Hamilton, Portland and Warrnambool districts. The directory came from the Nullawarre Post Office at the time when Charles Williams was the Post Master (mid 20th century) and delivered two runs of mail a day. His wife, Vida was the Post Mistress. Nullawarre is a small agricultural settlement 25 kilometres south east of Warrnambool and today has a general store, Post Office and school. This telephone directory, which has local provenance (Nullawarre Post Office), will be of great use to researchers as it contains the names and addresses of private individuals and businesses in the Western District of Victoria in 1969. It is also of interest as many of the entries give the names of the country properties at that time and the entries are listed separately under the names of the various towns. This is a soft-cover booklet of 392 pages. The front cover is multi-coloured and has a photograph of a parrot and the back cover has an advertisement in blue and white. There are 200 white pages and 192 pink pages of telephone numbers in Western Victoria in 1969. The printing throughout is black and the pages are very faded. communications, warrnambool, history of warrnambool, 055 telephone directory

A dark cream coloured cardboad cover with black information on the front. Top right hand corner reads RM 11-4861-1 and under this Department of the Army Technical Manual. The name of the manual is in the middle and at the botton is the insignia of the United States of America War Office with Headquarters, Department of the Army February 1963. There are three punch holes down the left hand side and two metal staples.united states - armed forces - service manuals, department of the army, electrical communications systems engineering, technical manual

A brownish coloured cardboard cover with black information on the front. Top right hand reads T M 11-486-2 and under this reads Department Of The Army Technical Manual. At the bottom of the cover is the insignia of the United States of Americal War Office with the Department Of The Army . August 1956. There are three punch hles down the left had side and there is evidence that the manual was held together with some form of metal as there are rust areas around the holes. The manual is held together with one rusty staple at the top left hand corner. The manual is stored in a plastic bag.united states - armed forces - service manuals, electrical communications systems engineering, technical manual, department of the army, united states war office