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24.01.2022 Hi all, please like and share. Keith Cook is keen to support our history group.

23.01.2022 A lovely piece of history about Drouin.

23.01.2022 Tony Osler just came and spoke to us last year about his career in radio and some of the funny events that happened during his career. R.I.P. Tony Osler

19.01.2022 Very interesting information in this week’s Gazette about the historic Hollies site. Well worth a read.

19.01.2022 https://youtu.be/OWcqxUm_IvY

15.01.2022 We have recently been asked about a planting of trees at Drouin Primary School commentating WW1 soldiers. I came across a newspaper article on TROVE referring to this planting as ANZAC Grove. Gippsland Independent Friday 20 July 1917 Page 2... DROUIN STATE SCHOOL Arbor Day was observed at the Drouin school on Friday 13th if July. It has been decided to form an Anzac Grove in portion of the school ground and in this thirteen trees were planted in memory of the old boys who have made the supreme sacrifice. Messrs Boon and Sunley, members of the School Committee, and several friends and relatives assisted in the ceremony. The trees will be reverently cared for, and they will keep green the memory of the thirteen gallant men. Their names are:- Thomas Bright, William Clover, Leslie Faragher, Burt Faragher, David Colley, Esca Gabbett, Leonard Franklin, Wolstan Govan, Arthur Higgs, Samuel Hooppell, Andrew McCarthy, Henry Haysom and Frank Roberts. The article continues about goods collected to be sent to the Caufield Military Hospital. I spoke to Iris Maxfield today who started teaching at Drouin in 1948. She had no idea about the ANZAC Grove. We both think it may have been the mahogany gums along School Road. Does anyone have any knowledge about this planting of memorial trees. Please ask any older members of your family if the have any memories regarding this planting. I feel sad that it is part of our lost history. Shelley Duncan

15.01.2022 How many entries can we add?

12.01.2022 Drouin Football Club - 1913. Copied from Barry Fuhrman 15/10/1987. Individuals indentified: Guido and Frank Fuhrman. Museums Victoria Collections.

04.01.2022 Local paper Aug 1909, some of the local businesses and the court report. If only that was the worst crime happening in Drouin now.

02.01.2022 Drouin History Group will not be meeting until at least the 14th of April due to the closure of West Gippsland Libraries from 5pm today.Drouin History Group will not be meeting until at least the 14th of April due to the closure of West Gippsland Libraries from 5pm today.

01.01.2022 Have you listened to the story of The Hollies. This is an important part of Drouin’s history. Take the time to follow the events in a fascinating life. Shelley Duncan

01.01.2022 Some of our followers may know someone who can help Bunyip Historical Society with this fine endeavour.

01.01.2022 IT HAPPENED HERE: THE AMAZING STORY OF JOICE NANKIVELL LOCH: AUSTRALIA'S MOST DECORATED WOMAN YOU'VE PROBABLY NEVER HEARD OF... You may never have heard of Joi...ce NanKivell Loch, but her humanitarian work was prolific. Born in 1897 into a wealthy sugar plantation farming family in Ingham, North Queensland, Joice's family relocated to Gippsland after the abolishment of Pacific Island Labour made their farm unviable. On the sugar plantation, Joice witnessed the atrocities against the ‘Kananka’ people (as they were historically described), and she also saw Aboriginal children treated appallingly, Gippsland based researcher Mary Howlett said. "So she developed a really strong social conscience from a young age. The family lived in a rustic shack with a dirt floor at Boolarra before moving to a house in Drouin, where Mary attended school for seven years. After refusing to be match-made with a wealthy squatter, Joice worked as a secretary at Melbourne University, until she married her husband, Gallipoli veteran Sydney Loch in 1919. The pair travelled to Ireland where they worked as journalists, reporting on the civil war in Dublin, before moving on to London. They wanted to get to Europe to work with people who were disenfranchised from World War 1, so they joined the Quaker Relief Movement, Ms Howlett said. Financed by the Qakers, the couple were posted to impoverished Russia and then Greece, where Joice taught farming skills, provided medical assistance and set up industries for displaced people. She set up a rug making business and Sydney set up a carpentry school, Ms Howlett said. They were trying to get people out of the most atrocious poverty and set up industries for them. But Joice’s most heroic act came when she was posted to a refugee centre in Romania, and saved 1000 Polish and Jewish women and children from the Nazis. Under the guise of organising a seaside holiday, Joice lead a dangerous escape mission known as 'Operation Pied Piper', which ferried the refugees on trains and boats across to Cypress, where they boarded an Australian warship bound for Haifa, Israel. Joice and Sydney (who died in 1955), lived out their remaining years in Ouranoupolis, Greece, where they continued their social enterprise business teaching villagers how to weave rugs. Joice, who died in 1982, was awarded 11 medals during her lifetime, including The Order of the Pheonix in Greece, The Poland Gold Cross, a medal presented by the King of Serbia and Member of the Order of the British Empire presented by King George V. Her life story is detailed in the book, 'Blue Ribbons, Bitter Bread': The Story of Joice Loch, Australia's Most Decorated Woman, by Susanna D Vries, 2000