Arthur Gorrie
It was a big day for Gympie region veterans and their supporters on Monday, when Gympie RSL and Legacy officials played their part in marking 100 years of Legacy. the charity which supports the families of defence force personnel killed or maimed, physically or psychologically in the service of the nation.
Proudest among them was RSL veterans services officer Angelique Clarey, who carried the Legacy Torch through Gympie on its way down the Australian east coast, a journey which began in Poziers, France, and which will end in Melbourne.
Ms Clarey is also a Gympie Legatee and part of the region’s Legacy Contact Group.
The torch travelled from Maryborough on Monday to Gympie later in the afternoon and was welcomed to town by an enthusiastic supporters’ group, including Legacy Australia CEO Graham Boyd.
The Legacy torch relay is one of Australia’s larger fundraising operations, marking a century since the charity was formed in Melbourne, on the model of a promise made in the trenches of France in World War I by soldiers offering to look after the families of any of them who did not survive the war.
Vietnam veteran Ivan Friske chairs the contact group and enthusiastically backed Ms Clarey’s successful campaign to have Gympie included in the torch relay.
The relay began in Poziers, part of the Western Front battlefield, and involved runners taking it through Europe and Asia before arriving in Australia and being carried through Perth, Adelaide, Darwin and Canberra, before its final run to Melbourne, arriving in October.