THE following comment was posted by reader Kelly Dean on the Central Western Daily’s Facebook page in response to a story headlined: Fairbridge Children’s Park to pay tribute to migrant students ...
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I am so over reading about the hardship that kids faced at Fairbridge. Why don’t you, CWD, ever print something positive?
There have been many children leave Fairbridge to go on and achieve great heights from the start that Fairbridge gave them. My father and his brother went to Fairbridge and my dad led a very meaningful life and was lucky to have had the opportunity to come to Fairbridge.
I’m not saying it wasn’t hard or tough and I am not saying that at times some bad things didn’t occur, but why can’t Fairbridge been seen in context with society back then and not be judged by today’s standards?
Back in the 1940s, 50s and 60s if you grew up in the country it was a pretty tough life. You, as a child, got up early to do chores, you walked miles to go to school, that’s even if you had the opportunity.
The children that grew up in Fairbridge got paid pocket money, the played sports, they went to school including high school, they received school reports, they went on a holiday once a year to the beach, they had their own bank books, they owned their own farm animals, they attended the local movies, they were taught skills so they could get jobs, they ran a self-sufficient self-funded farm with no government funding.
I am very proud of my family’s history and proud my dad was an Old Fairbridgian. We as a family have a memorial tree in the Fairbridge Memorial Drive in memory of my father.
How about you spend money on keeping the drive nice or perhaps look at extending it and just upgrade the roadside park that is already there? What is the need to extend the park or build another memorial? Add a few more tables, add covered bins, tar the road and perhaps put something informative and honest about Fairbridge, whether it is a billboard or photo display.
Cherish the memories. As a younger child attended many Fairbridge reunions. My memories of those weekends were of mateship, celebration and thankfulness.
Perhaps you, David Hill, as the management committee chairman should really look and listen to what the community wants. You need to start by acknowledging Fairbridge was not all bad.
