General News
27 July, 2024
A patient comeback
Dimboola Hospital’s building saw the return of a face which it hadn’t seen since its infancy in the late 1950s, which brought back many memories for 90-year-old George Allitt.
Mr Allitt was the truck driver who delivered the very first load of timber used to build the hospital, and returned last week as a patient for a short time.
Retired and living in Jeparit, Mr Allitt required medical treatment at Wimmera Base Hospital in Horsham recently.
As his health improved, he was transferred to the acute ward at the Dimboola campus, the first time he had been back since that delivery long ago.
Mr Allitt said he would often drive past the Dimboola hospital and recall his early trip there, but he’d never been inside until now.
“It’s a nice-looking hospital,” Mr Allitt said.
“They’ve looked after me well.”
Mr Allitt grew up on his parents’ farm near Lawloit.
When the farm was sold, he started driving the family’s trucks to earn a living.
One of Mr Allitt’s earliest jobs was picking up a load of timber at the Port Adelaide docks on a Friday afternoon, and delivering it the next morning to the site of the soon-to-be-built Dimboola Hospital.
Mr Allitt said after he dropped off the load in Dimboola, he and his mate stopped off at the hotel in Pimpinio and stayed the night.
The next day, he was at the roadhouse in Dadswells Bridge when he heard that the Pimpinio Hotel had burned down.
After running his transport business, keeping tabs on 28 trucks for most of his life, Mr Allitt retired.