Moonee Valley Family & Local History Blog

Maybe this could occur, but I suspect not! Travelling to the city each day for work in the 1960's, finding myself out of the office on an errand at 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month when the whole city came to a standstill. Everything came to a halt, the trams in Swanston Street, pedestrians and all the vehicular traffic... The noise of a busy city absent, complete quiet for 2 minutes, is lodged in my memory. A silent tribute. A sign of respect for the fallen. My viewpoint looking down Swanston Street from Lonsdale Street right the way down to Princes Bridge and beyond, a city frozen for those few moments, unforgettable. Will it ever happen again in a city of nearly 4.5 million people?  Image sourced from: State Library of Victoria ( www.slv.vic.gov.au ) Annette is an obsessive family history researcher and regular patron at Sam Merrifield Library.

What Remembrance Day means to me is taking the time to reflect on the horror of the First World War and trying to think about what people must have gone through then. However as I have grown up I have seen the day change from a day where we stood still in the playground , to one where we don’t stop and reflect at all. I can remember working one day a few years ago and asking my boss if we were going to stop and pause for Remembrance Day like I always had done growing up. The response I got was that they didn’t do that as people who were visiting were not going to stop so why should we? I don’t know what caused this change in public opinion about the day, but I think people care more about ANZAC Day than they do Remembrance Day. Image Sourced from: Chris Radburn, Press Association Images, Britannica Image Quest  Steve is the Local History and Information Services Librarian at Sam Merrifield Library. To contribute to Moonee Valley Remembrance Day Memories please email ...

Remembrance Day is a reminder to us all of the cost of war and allows people the time to reflect upon this. However as time has passed Remembrance Day has gone from being the National day of memory for all wars to being sidelined by the more popular ANZAC day. As part of Moonee Valley Libraries Remembrance Day program we want to ask you a question: "What does Remembrance Day mean to you?"   Image created by: Cole Bennetts / Getty Images We want to know what it means to you and what are your memories of this national day of remembrance. How has it changed? Do you pause? Should we do more to ensure it's relevance? Has your opinion on the day changed? We want to hear your stories about Remembrance Day. We are asking for people to become Guest Bloggers of this blog and to tell your story to other people. We are looking for as many posts as possible in the lead up to Remembrance Day so don't delay. There will be no word limit, but we ask that you...