Anzac dawn commemorations of remembrance

Returned and serving Servicemen and Servicewomen, Service organisations, and the general public, are all welcome to participate in Anzac Day services and parades.

Masterton

Participants will assemble at 5.30am at Masterton’s War Memorial Stadium (Trust House Recreation Centre) in Dixon Street, to parade to the Cenotaph in QE Park for services.

Dignitaries including the Mayor of Masterton Gary Caffell and Kieran McAnulty, Wairarapa’s MP, will be invited to lay wreaths, if their calendars allow. A lone piper will sound its haunting notes while wreaths are laid.

Guest speaker Cadet Corporal Norris, from the 21 Squadron Air Training Corp, will speak about a distinguished former Masterton resident and WWII aviator who received several awards. Students from Makoura College’s Military Service Academy will attend, and one will recite the Ode of Remembrance in Māori.

Masterton’s brass band will play. Participants can march back to Club Wairarapa – the home of Masterton’s RSA (Returned and Services Association) - for breakfast, available for a koha.

Kaiparoro

A service will be held at the ANZAC Memorial Bridge on State Highway 2, near Eketahuna, commencing at 2:00pm. It was built in 1922 by Alfred Falkner, father of one of six local soldiers commemorated on the bridge, and is now a category 1 listed structure with the New Zealand Historic Places Trust.

Parking will be available at Miller Reserve and there is a walkway to the bridge.

Following the service, an afternoon tea will be held at Pukaha Mount Bruce Wildlife Centre at $5.00 per person.

This year, the contribution and service of Nurses in the Defence Force will be acknowledged. Private Margret McAnulty, killed in WWII and memorialised on the bridge, will be remembered.

Tinui

Tinui will be sticking to its Anzac Day tradition this year, despite the clean-up from Cyclone Gabrielle. This year marks the 107th service in the town. Brigadier Anne Campbell will be this year’s guest speaker and Tinui parish’s Reverend Steve Thomson will officiate. Wairarapa TV will broadcast the service which begins at 10.30am on 25 April.

On 25 April 1916 the World’s first ever Anzac service was held at the Church of the Good Shepherd. After the service the Tinui community erected a wooden cross on top of Mt. Maunsell (Tinui Taipo) as one of New Zealand’s first memorials to the Gallipoli Campaign.

This year, the usual walk along Anzac Walkway from Tinui Cemetery to the memorial cross, following the service, will not go ahead. The aim is to re-open the walkway for next year’s services.