POPPY DAY APPEAL

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXII, Issue 12526, 11 April 1935, Page 5

POPPY DAY APPEAL

SALES ON SATURDAY

BIG DISTRICT CAMPAIGN

AIDING DISTRESSED SOLDIERS

Within a fortnight, every town and village in New Zealand and Australia will celebrate the 20th. anniversary of the landing at Gallipoli, effected in the early morning hours of April 25, 1915. Anzao Day .still claims the reverence of all, for the memory of the fallen soldiers of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, who died on the Peninsula or itt other theatres of war in which the “Silent- Division” followed its “path of duty anij its road to glory.” The sacrifices of the fallen arc-enshrined for. £*ll time in the anniversary which New Zealand keeps as a public day of recognition, and to. none are those sacrifices~more real than to those of the division who survived, and part in successive anniversary' celebrations with unremitting zeal. ■lt is a- melancholy fact that among tho' men who survived are many whose sacrifices in the service of their country have been hardly less groat than these of the fallen- To hundreds of men who served in the war, and returned to take up civil occupations, to assume the responsibilities of life outside the ranks ofthe- Division, the passing years have been full of tribulation. Eight- years ago the situation resulting from unemployment, and its effect upen the returned incn who had suffered economic disability, led to- the resuscitation of the Gisborne Returned Soldiers’ Association, a body which in he meantime has performed' remarkable services, not. only for the. d'-s----tressed section of the ex-soldicis, but also for the community at large. The aerodrome from which will operate the regular daily passenger air service, which tho Acting-Premier will officially inaugurate 011 Morglay next Would not have been the public asset it now represents, hut for the action of the Gisborne R.S.A. in furnishing funds for its acquisition and early development. The Macrae hath coukl hot have been built, but for the assistance given from the funds of the R.S.A. A dozen other works of importance, now representing public assots, owe their existence to-day to the enterprise and financial judgment shown by the R-S.A. executive. And this small catalogue of public works floes not take into account the aid given to the general unemployed, through the worst years of the slump as a result of cattle and sheep drives organised by the returned men It may be -said that in the disbursement of money invested in each of the major public works named, and in the dispensation of aid to hard-hit families through the relief depot, the soldiers have been helping their own. This must bo admitted, but the soldiers draw satisfaction from the circumstance that while helping their own men and their fam ilies, they have never discriminated in the general dispensation of relief from source:.?' built up by the general public. The basis of practically all tiie work carried on By the Gisborne R,S.A. has been the Poppy Day fund reinforced each year by the returns from the Poppy Gay appeal, which is to> be renewed on Saturday. The appeal is one that can be commended to every citizen and to every country dweller as one ‘deserving of the fullest support.