The Fair Dinkums

Imagine it is mid 1915. Around these parts just a few months ago the community was jublilantly sending young men to war. Now the devastating news from Gallipoli has hit home and the community is reeling. The area around Essendon has been hit particularly hard - dozens of local men were killed at Gallipoli within days. But more recruits are still needed.

The men known as the "Fair Dinkums" weren't naive when they enlisted. These fruit pickers and farmers, bootmakers and blacksmiths, miners and mailmen of the 7th Battalion were a brave and ingenious bunch; just think of William Scurry, who went to school in Ascot Vale, and whose ingenuity led to the self-firing rifle mechanism that helped enable the safe evacuation of the ANZAC troops from Gallipoli.


Glenn McFarlane, experienced journalist and author of The Fair Dinkums, will share their heartbreaking, gutsy and remarkable stories with us at Sam Merrifield Library on Wednesday evening. Book online now.

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