REMEMBRANCE DAY
I donated to Legacy Australia which helps 52,000 Australians currently, families of soldiers who have passed on.
In 1923 Legacy made a promise to help families carry on with their lives after the loss or injury of a loved one due to military service. Their work continues today.
“I think [people] think a ‘digger’ is an old veteran in a wheelchair being marched down Anzac parade. But anybody that’s done one day’s service, as far as the government is concerned, is a veteran, which is an interesting change in the way we think about our veteran community,” said Legacy’s President Mark Lax in a recent interview with the ABC.
Mr Lax understood there might have been a belief once that as the generations of World War II and Vietnam veterans grew old and passed on that there may be a belief in the community that Legacy would become a smaller operation.
Not anymore.
Like other charities COVID affected collecting for donations this year particularly around the time of Remembrance Day where the biggest fund raising occurs.
“We would normally send our [supporters] to the shopping centres with the badges and the bears, but this year we’re not able to do that,” Mr Lax said.
In Queensland in 2020 Legacy was there to help 153 people with a disability, support over 5,800 widowers, more than 60 families with and 217 youths.
“They do realise people are thinking of them, and I think that’s really important,” said Mr Lax.
One example is a young boy named Javas who needed a new laptop when the switch was made to online schooling during COVID.
“That laptop, it is more than a computer for Javas. It’s love. It’s support. Looking at it reminds him of Legacy and that connects him to his father.” – Yulia, Javas’s mother.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
-Lloyd Marken
