By CASEY NEILL
GREATER Dandenong’s Anzac Day commemorations started on Sunday.
Springvale RSL Sub-Branch held a march down Springvale Road, from Union Grove to the cenotaph outside Springvale Town Hall.
Former sub-branch president and World War II veteran Geoffrey Charters read the first lesson, taken from St John’s Gospel Ch: 15:9-13.
Students from eight schools interrupted their holidays to participate, and Hotham MP Clare O’Neil, Lyndhurst MP Martin Pakula, Mayor Jim Memeti and councillors Loi Truong and Sean O’Reilly also attended.
Springvale RSL president Michael Custance said the event was smaller than usual due to Easter and school holidays.
“Next year, our thing’s going to be bigger than Ben Hur, because it’s the 100th anniversary,” he said.
“We’re already planning.”
The Noble Park RSL sub-branch’s march and service attracted a slightly larger crowd.
Guest speaker, Vietnam Veteran and former Noble Park RSL sub-branch president Gordon Murray mentioned Noble Park residents who’d served in conflicts over the years.
He said they’d been instrumental and the suburb should be very proud.
“This RSL is one of the best RSLs in Australia,” he said.
“When you mention you’re from Noble Park they say ’that’s the one that does the work for veterans’.
“The same comradeship we have here is what those World War I Diggers had.”
Dandenong RSL will mark Anzac Day with a Dawn Service at 5.45am on 25 April at the Pillars of Freedom on Clow Street, Dandenong.
A march from the RSL, at 44 Clow Street, to the Pillars of Freedom will follow at 10.30am.
See next week’s Journal for more Anzac Day coverage.
