''Table Tops'' was a free daily

newspaper A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as poli ...

produced for Australian Army personnel, published in the

Atherton Tableland The Atherton Tableland is a fertile plateau, which is part of the Great Dividing Range in Queensland, Australia. It has very deep, rich basaltic soils and the main industry is agriculture. The principal river flowing across the plateau is the B ...

Training Area in

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia,{{cite web, title= Provincial publishing proliferated in Australia's colonial era, publisher= PANPA, url= https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/eserv/UQ:9460/rk_panpa_0705.pdf, accessdate= 2008-12-04, archive-date= 30 September 2011, archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110930074157/https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/eserv/UQ:9460/rk_panpa_0705.pdf, url-status= live with regional editions produced abroad for serving personnel. ''Table Tops'' was produced by the staff of the '' AIF News'', who were part of the First Australian Army Printing and Press Unit. The newspaper was produced seven days a week: weekday and Saturday editions were four pages long while Sunday editions were eight pages. The pages were demy quarto size. Occasional special editions were produced in addition to the daily editions. It contained news on the progress of the war, as well as home news such as current events in Australia and sport results. It was published in Atherton during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, where it was typeset on

Linotype machine The Linotype machine ( ) is a "line casting" machine used in printing which is manufactured and sold by the former Mergenthaler Linotype Company and related It was a hot metal typesetting system that cast lines of metal type for one-time use. Li ...

s and then printed on an old Wharfedale printing press on overnight print runs so that the paper was ready to be sent to units for breakfast. During the Second World War, the editor of ''Table Tops'' was Major C. H. Cheong. Regional editions were produced abroad for serving personnel. These were produced in camps, with mobile generators and truck-mounted printing equipment. News was collected by listening to

short-wave radio Shortwave radio is radio transmission using radio frequencies in the shortwave bands (SW). There is no official definition of the band range, but it always includes all of the high frequency band (HF), which extends from 3 to 30 MHz (app ...

broadcasts from

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

, the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

.Caption on Australian War Memorial photograph 124152 These regional editions were produced at places such as Morotai in the

Maluku Islands The Maluku Islands ( ; , ) or the Moluccas ( ; ) are an archipelago in the eastern part of Indonesia. Tectonics, Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located in West ...

, and in

Balikpapan Balikpapan is a seaport city in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Located on the east coast of the island of Borneo, the city is the financial center of Kalimantan. Balikpapan is the city with the largest economy in Kalimantan with an estimated 20 ...

and

Brunei Brunei, officially Brunei Darussalam, is a country in Southeast Asia, situated on the northern coast of the island of Borneo. Apart from its coastline on the South China Sea, it is completely surrounded by the Malaysian state of Sarawak, with ...

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

References

External links

Australian War Memorial collections search page for viewing the photographs referenced above
Defunct newspapers published in Queensland Australian Army Atherton, Queensland Daily newspapers published in Australia Military newspapers published in Australia