On this day 49 years ago, The Canberra Times reported on a 45-year-old former drover who invented a device which would potentially revolutionise washing machines to heavy prime movers.

Eric Willmot, of Flynn, was selected as Australian Inventor of the Year on the TV show What'll They Think of Next?, for his invention of the cycloidal variable-ratio transmission.

He demonstrated a model of his invention to then-prime minister Malcom Fraser.

"He seems to know a bit about mechanical things," said Willmot, a Queenslander of Aboriginal descent who also worked as a rodeo rider, teacher and teacher educator.

At the time of the report, Willmot was the principal of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies in Canberra. He said the key to his work as a theoretical engineer was his training in mathematics.

Included in his winnings was a car fitted with an automatic transmission, ironically the very kind of machinery which his invention would make obsolete. His invention was the result of nine years' work, many frustrations and dead-ends and about $20,000.

See: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/126853928