A two week exhibition commemorating the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War opens Thursday afternoon 8 November in Narooma’s SoART Gallery.
The exhibition is Narooma Historical Society’s major project for the year involving a team of people and assisted by a ‘Saluting their Service’ grant from the Australian Government.
‘It is very appropriate the exhibition will be next door to Narooma’s First World War Memorial which is the School of Arts Hall, now operating as the Kinema,’ said Society President Laurelle Pacey.
‘Many people walk past the Kinema each day but few notice the Honour Roll on the front façade listing the town’s ‘lads who donned khaki’ 100 years ago but we’re about to change that.’
Part of the exhibition will put faces and stories to the names listed, often with assistance from their descendants.
The rest of the exhibition will be about what happened in this area during the War, including its impact on local industries, recruitment drives, fundraising to pay for the War, as well as the aftermath including the influenza epidemic.
‘Children from Narooma Public School will also re-enact the Tin Can Band that left from the school to join in the celebrations in the old School of Arts Hall (where the newsagency now is) that spontaneously erupted when news of the Armistice reached Narooma,’ Ms Pacey said.
The students will leave the school just before 2pm on Thursday 8th and march down to SoART Gallery making a lot of noise as they go. The official opening will follow at 3pm.
The exhibition will then be open from Friday 9th November to Tuesday 20th November 10am-4pm.
Above: Narooma Remembers -These five young Narooma men enlisted on the same day in 1915 in the 30th Battalion – Arthur ‘Smacker’ Annis, back left, George Sykes, James Anderson; Harry McDiarmid, front left, and his brother Ray McDiarmid. They seem to have all worked in the timber industry at that time Photo courtesy Judy Macdonald, Arthur Annis’ granddaughter.
