In early 1973, the rail unions perfomed a number of one day stoppages, including no rail services on Sundays.
This Sunday stoppage affected newspaper deliveries in many parts of the country.
One solution for Devon was to fly newspapers to Exeter Airport loaded in commercial passenger aircraft.
These needed to be unloaded and transferred to vans for distribution to the newsagents.
An enterprising member of Killerton managed to arrange for a group of us to go to the Airport at 2am on one of the affected Sundays to help upload.
The bundles of newspapers had been thrown into plane between the seats. This necessitated us having to pull and manhandle the bundles out from between the seats and then pass them one to another the length of the plane.
It was tiring and difficult work. Anyone who has worked with newspaperswill recall that the bundles were died with course string that was most unpleasant to handle, especually with soft student hands.
However, with £10 cash for two hours work it was pretty good deal – and as I was on bar duty the evening previously during a Jazz Night in the cellars at Killerton, I had the key and was able to open the bar for a pint when we returned at 5am.