Sheens Motors video

Video taken of Sheens Motors and the associated BP service station, Great Western Highway, Penrith about 1960. The video runs for 5 minutes 22 seconds, it may take time to load but be patient.

Commentary as told by Tim Sheens

"The video starts with showing the caryard on the Great Western Highway, Sheens Motors, and this was adjacent to the BP service station which we also operated. This is right opposite the Myers complex which then turned into the Penrith Plaza which is a big shopping complex, the service station and caryard are no longer there. These are the days when people brought their car in and you had to service them, and you had to listen to the fuel or otherwise it spat back at you because they didn't have the automatic cut-offs. You had super or you had regular and diesel and that was it, diesel was mostly for your trucks, there were very few diesels. You can see in the video quite a lot of the old cars of the time, this was the late 50s or early 60s, before 62 when my father died, and it was in a Humber car that he actually showed that he was killed in, one of the cars that they were selling. Attached to the service station was a shop (cafe) as well where my mother worked with my grandmother occasionally. That's my father there at the 1.57 mark serving petrol, that's the cafe at 2.03 where my mother served. I worked here myself after my father died, I worked selling petrol once or twice a week. There's my grandfather and father sitting, my father smoking at 2.17. There's myself and my brother at 2.20 and my mother at 2.21 threatening God knows what. It was a Rootes car dealership which was Commer trucks, Hillmans, Humbers, there's a number of them there at 2.35. We also sold second hand cars, you'll see the FC Holden. There was no freeway at this point, so everyone came through Penrith this was on the main road just before you got down to the bottom of Penrith and crossed over the Nepean River. That's my grandfather there in the white shirt at 3.04 serving. That's my grandfather at 3.19, George Sheens, and my father at 3.23, you can see where I get my ears from, and my forehead. The rest of the video really just depicts looking at the yard and the service station. I think it was done by BP. There's a big Commer truck, I remember going down with my father to pick one of them up and riding home in a brand new one from Sydney as a youngster. Some older trucks and cars in there, they sold out of that old building there at 3.52 - a little caravan. I sold a couple of cars there myself as a young bloke, I used to have to sit there on a Saturday when they went drinking and mind the shop on Saturday afternoons after football. This taken at 4.13 just showing the cars, some of the second hand cars - a VW there at 4.20. At 4.27 you can see from another angle and this is from across the highway. At 4.33 which is out front of the Myers store which is now the Penrith Plaza. There are the service bays at 5.06 where you can see that they would often service the cars as they came through, those were the days when everyone could work on their own motor before computers."