Makan – No. 74
Xmas & New Year, 1952 / 1953

Official Organ of the 2/30th Bn. A.I.F. Assn

COMMITTEE

Dear dig,

The 7th Annual reunion was held at Arncliffe Drill Hall on Friday, 21/11/52. It was as usual a great success and for the 154 people who attended the night was a remarkable one. The years drop away when one meets those chaps again and we are sure that they are now looking forward to the next reunion.

It is right to place the credit for such successful functions on the shoulders of those who deserve it. To Johnny Parsons must go the credit for obtaining the hall for us and for purchasing the liquid refreshments. To Reg Ellis and his wife, Bessie, we owe our thanks for their help in cutting up 40 lbs of Kameruka Cheese for the night. The cheese and biscuits were very acceptable and of course were not as expensive as the suppers we have had in the past. Alan Penfold and Alex Dandie took the money at the door this year and were a good acquisition as they remained sober enough, as usual, to account for all the money received. The Barmen themselves did a mighty job. They were limited to Bluey McIver, Doug Blanshard and Ron McBurney because of the small number of jugs available and consequently they were flat out for a few hours. It was 9.15 p.m. before they even touched a drink for themselves. Considering that they dished out 81 gallons of beer during the night in small jugs, we think you will agree that they did their fair share of the work. The only hold up in the distribution of the liquor was when we opened one keg to find that it had gone sour. The smell in the bar-room was atrocious but the Barmen did their best to distribute it under the guise that it was Brookvale beer. However, the customers, after one sip, did not care whether it had come from Brookvale or Adelaide and they just refused to drink it. We think that the small amount of sour beer which we managed to get rid of helped to slow down the drinking quite considerably. Vince Leonard and Monty Montgomery worked like Trojans at the pianos and contributed a great deal to the success of the night.

This year we were fortunate in having with us a few delightful friends. Doug Leathardt and Ray Cosgrove of the Repatriation Dept. were there, you all know them, and we had Major Ball of 2/15 Field Regiment also as a guest. There were lots of others from other units, including your old friend Lloyd Cahill, and we also had the pleasure of meeting Bob Skene, the famous polo player. Bob, of course, was a prisoner-of-war and is well known to many of you. You may recall his Changi Lectures.

The speeches were short and sweet. Major Ball, in his little reply, emphasised the ties between the two units. He spoke rather well and was given a good reception. Doug Leathardt, who has had a lot of experience in reunions, being a Digger of World War One, said that our reunion would grow even bigger in numbers as the years go on. Well, this may be so, and we hope that it will be that way, but we have certainly started well with almost 25% of our total returned strength at each reunion. When the reunion was over a team of willing horses cleaned up the place so that we left it as we had found it.

We must not forget to mention the two beer drawers from the St George Regiment who assisted us very ably, they were quite a help to us.

We saw Alan Hudson for the first time in many years. He is no longer the slim young fellow we knew but a very well filled out gent who can no longer attain the great speeds he was capable of a few yeas ago. Alan is prosperous - being farmer, that normally follows - and he has a little family of two boys and two girls.

Alan Good is looking Al also. He has graduated to the ranks of the family man, being the proud possessor of a daughter, four years of age, and a little boy, 18 months old.

We have news of Jack Lynch, that great roaring fellow who left the Unit when we were at Bathurst. Jack is a farmer now at Mona Vale, Deep Water, on the North Coast. He is making quite a success of his farm.

Dadda Duprez looked very well at the Reunion and, for the moment at any rate, hopes to remain out of hospital. He is working at the R.T.O. office at Railway Square, and will help you to obtain an air or rail passage anywhere in Australia. He's a very handy man to know because often you may be told that all the seats have been booked out on interstate planes and trains, whereas Dadda has access to a seat or two which may have been kept back.

Geoff Waite is in the Estate Agency business, and although their palmy days are over, there is still a lot of money in the game. He has three sons.

Although our interstate visitors did not arrive this year, some people came very long distances to attend. Jacky Fell arrived from Cessnock.

It was. very pleasant to meet Bernie McMahon after some years. Bernie has come up in the world recently and has graduated to the Managership of the Rockdale Branch of the National Bank of Australasia. He is living at Brighton with his wife and family of three and now that he has been stationed in Sydney, we hope to see him at every meeting.

January 14th

We remind you that we will be holding our Annual Commemoration Ceremony at the Cenotaph at 1.30 p.m., on Wednesday, January 14th. We ask you to make an effort and participate in this wreath laying this year, the eleventh year since the Battalion went into action. The actual ceremony will not take more then two or three minutes. If you work in the city please make an effort to attend.

Jim Montgomery’s blindness has not prevented him from following his favourite game of bowls. We noticed in a Bowls magazine that Monty recently made a trip to Dungog to show the local bowlers a few of the finer points of the game.

The Association sends its congratulations to John Taylor and his wife on the birth of their son, Ian, at the St. John of God Hospital, Perth. John is still practising in Perth and has adopted the State as his own.

Doug McLaggan has changed his address to Clovelly. He has only just realised that the old tale that "two' can live as cheaply as one" does not stand up to a mathematical investigation, but he is doing quite well in his calling of accountancy and has little to worry him.

3/- per day Claim

By the time most of you read this MAKAN you will have received the application form which will entitle you to your first payment of £32. If you have not received the first form by this time you would be advised to write to Command Pay Office, Victoria Barracks, Sydney, and mark the envelope “Distribution Japanese Assets” - you should quote your Army number in your enquiry.

Now that you have received your first payment, many of you will be wondering when the next payment will be coming along. Well, you should be able to make a fairly accurate estimate yourself. It has taken seven years to receive this first payment and this payment has been made from the sale of Japanese assets within Australia. Second payment, if ever made, will be from the sale of Japanese assets held at the moment in other countries. As far as we understand it, the money will be collected by the International Red Cross who will then have to be persuaded to hand the money to the Australian Red Cross, who will, in turn, have to be persuaded to disgorge the money in pounds, shillings and pence to us. We all know that before the money arrives the Red Cross will claim that it will be distributed to us in cash, but when it is actually here, it could be a different story. However, we have a nasty precedent to guide us inasmuch as from the millions of pounds collected specifically for us during the war we received, after the war, from the balance remaining, not as much as one single farthing in actual cash. No doubt statistics could be produced to say that the bulk of this money has been used to benefit ex-servicemen, but the plain fact is that most of us prefer to see the money in our own hands so that we can decide which way we will derive the maximum benefit from it.

Before you receive your £32 you received a brochure from the 8th Division Council requesting that you subscribe to their big appeal. The brochure was very cleverly written and should appeal to many ex members of the 8th Division. You can see from the brochure that one or more of the 30th Battalion have already subscribed to the appeal. You will also notice that our Unit Association is listed on the brochure as being a member of the Council and, of course, you will notice Black Jack's name listed as patron of the Council. Now, with these three references to the Unit appearing on the brochure, an outsider could quite easily suppose that we were in favour of this appeal. However, the Executive repeat once more that they can see no benefit to any member of this Association or to any member of the 8th Division generally in subscribing to this Fund, The Executive are particularly anxious to record the opposition of our Association to this appeal in order that, at a later date, you may not be able to point to the Association and claim that the Executive gave you bad advice. The Association will have nothing to do with any aspect of either the collection of this appeal money or of the direction to which any of the money will be placed. You should be quite clear now on the Association's attitude to this matter.

The Old Man and the Executive of the Association take this opportunity of wishing you the very best for Christmas and the New Year.

We send an especial greeting to those of us who are in hospital and to those who are living interstate, and outside Australia. We give you, at this appropriate time, a gentle reminder, particularly if you have reached a prosporous state of affairs, to remember to offer a helping hand to those individuals of the Unit who, through no fault of their own, are not doing so well.

Cheerio,

STAN ARNEIL

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