Maroochy RSL is set to celebrate it’s 90th birthday with a black tie gala event on 30 July.
Local dignitaries, current and ex service men and women, volunteers and board members will come together with a night of remembrance featuring the 22 piece Australian Naval Band, a display of historical photographs telling the incredible journey of the past 90 years of Maroochy RSL.
Club CEO Clare Paton said the event would be an evening of reminiscing about what the club has meant to all involved and future plans for veteran support and advocacy into the years beyond.
She said Maroochy RSL has played a significant role in the Sunshine Coast community supporting many local community groups and charities.
“Established in 1932, Maroochy RSL is proud to be celebrating 90 years,” Clare said.
“During these decades, Maroochy RSL has made an outstanding contribution to members and the local community which epitomises the sacrifices of those who served in the defence of the nation and in the traditions of the ANZACs – mateship, courage, loyalty and sacrifice – values on which our RSL and Services Clubs were founded.”
Founded ninety years ago, Maroochydore RSL Sub Branch Charter was granted in May 1932. Meetings were first held in private homes, the ES and A bank premises, or anywhere else the public was kind enough to make available.
The Sub Branch and the Women’s Auxiliary provided a great deal of welfare assistance to veterans and widows of World War I.
In January 1939, application was made to the Lands Department for a grant of land to erect a Soldiers Memorial Hall. In April 1939, the erection of the Memorial Hall was approved for the portion of the land reserved as a Memorial Park bounded by First and Memorial Avenues and George Street.
After completion, activities of both business and social nature continued in the Memorial Hall in a routine manner for some years, focusing mainly on the welfare of veterans and their families.
The Club was later established on the land occupied by the Diggers Memorial Hall.
The Maroochydore and District Ex-Servicemen’s Club was officially opened in November 1972 and at that point in time the business activities of the Maroochy RSL and the Maroochydore and District Ex-Servicemen’s Club were arranged as separate entities, keeping close relations with each other which still remain today and the two have now amalgamated.
Clare said the most significant event in the affairs of the League was the building of RSL House, League headquarters opposite the Club in Memorial Avenue. In 1996 ‘RSL House’ was born and this great achievement was officially opened in the same year.
“Among the many benefits which the League derived from the establishment of ‘RSL House’ was the setting up of a prestigious Memorabilia Collection ‘preserving for posterity, records of the deeds and sacrifices of our veteran brothers and sisters’,” she said.
“So from humble beginnings Maroochy RSL as a not for profit, self-funded charity, stands strong with its main objectives still on the advocacy and welfare of the veteran community while preserving our history of those whom fought for our freedom.”
