Birdseye, Sylvia

Sylvia Merrill was born in 1902 near Port Augusta, South Australia and from an early age became friends with the Birdseye family, who ran a horse-and-coach business in Port Augusta. The Company ran a transport business between Adelaide and Mannum, and later became the first motorised country bus service. At the age of 19 Sylvia began working as a driver for the Company. She drove either a tray-top Buick or Studebaker sedan.

In 1923 Sylvia married Alfred Birdseye’s son Sydney and became the first woman in South Australia to hold a Commercial Driving Licence.

From 1926 she ran the Eyre Peninsula Motor Service which provided services to isolated towns and homesteads. Sylvia drove a modified red Reo Charabanc (coach) and sometimes slept under a tarpaulin on the roof of the vehicle.

Sylvia was dedicated to her job and drove over 3,000 kilometres each week for nearly 40 years, often at night while the passengers were asleep. She was nicknamed 'Grandmother Queen of the Open Road' and 'The Little Atom'. She wore overalls, maintained the vehicles herself and could change a wheel in less than five minutes. Her two children regularly travelled with her.

Sylvia became a director of the company in 1928 and the business operations extended to Port Augusta and Port Lincoln. ‘Send it by Birdseye' became a catchphrase in the area, and despite the difficult terrain covered the company became known for its reliability and good value for money. Sylvia would always make a detour to deliver urgent supplies and was resourceful when conditions were against her. In 1946 the Eyre Peninsula experienced record floods, which delayed her run by eight days. She was forced to find another way through the bush and the passengers survived on rations dropped by plane.

On 9 August 1962, while getting ready for a run to Port Lincoln, Sylvia had a stroke and died. She was buried in Centennial Park, and her daughter Sylvia inherited Birdseye Bus Service. Her achievements are commemorated to this day in many ways, two being the establishment of the Sylvia Birdseye Undergraduate Scholarship for Women studying civil engineering at the University of South Australia by Transport SA and the naming of the Cowell to Elliston road ‘the Birdseye Highway’.