Tomorrow is the 100th Anniversary of the ANZACS landing at Gallipoli Cove. An emotional day for all Australians as we stop and remember all those men and women that have served our country and are thankful for the sacrifices they made for us.
I have no direct relative that served in WWI. There are distant cousins, one from Mansfield that was a widower with a small daughter when he went to war. Sadly he did not return, leaving his little girl an orphan. There are terribly sad letters from her school teacher to the war office hoping to find any belongings of her fathers.
My maternal grandfather, Raymond Edward Mainard, did serve in WWII. He enlisted on the 16th of August, 1940 but managed to get married in February 1941 and start a family before being mobilised to Darwin in October, 1942. He was then shipped off to Papua New Guinea before eventually being discharged in October 1945.
Pa never told us grandkids much about the war. I think he felt it was quite traumatic. Each ANZAC day when I was growing up we would attend the mid morning service at the RSL hall in Heathcote with Nan and Pa. After the service Pa would go to the pub for a beer. It’s the only time I ever remember him going to the pub!
For my grandfather when the war ended he decided to further his career and so studied accounting by correspondence. In April 1948 he was admitted as an Associate to the Federal Institute of Accountants, what CPA Australia was originally known as.
He spent most of his working life as a management accountant with the Moe Dairy Co-op and became a Fellow of CPA Australia in 1966.
Unfortunately Pa passed away in 1991, quite a number of years before I achieved my CPA qualifications. Today I have hung his certificates in my office as I’m very proud to acknowledge his achievements as an accountant and I love the sense of a family history in my profession.
Tomorrow I will pin on his service medals and attend an ANZAC Day service and remember him for his war service as well as the many other men and women who have or are serving our country.
Lest we forget.
