Cobram Barooga RSL Sub-branch re-interns time capsule

The original capsule was exhumed due to civil works being undertaken during the construction of the Cobram Library with the Moira Shire Council taking care of it during the lockdown, while ceremonies were banned.

The re-laid capsule, located just behind the Cobram and District War Memorial will contain information recording the history of Cobram’s quest for a memorial that had been ongoing since 1919.

Additional information, not included at the time of the original internment, pertaining to the history of moving the memorial plaques from the now-demolished Clock Memorial to the entrance of the memorial in front of Sporties Barooga was also added.

The original retrieval date of 2050 has also been pushed back to 2068, 150 years from the original 1918 Armistice Day.

To ensure that there would be people around who would remember to retrieve the time capsule, descendants of Paul Bell, a local soldier killed during World War II, and descendants of Michael Desmond O’Dwyer, a First World War veteran and the first president of the Cobram RSL Sub-branch, were in attendance and helped lower the capsule into its place.

The descendants included Charlie Hazelman, 4, Billie Hazelman, 5, Allegra O’Dwyer, 8, Penny O’Dwyer, 5, and Charlotte O’Dwyer, 8.

Each child also left an important memento within the re-interned time capsule.

Rob Brown, who fought in Vietnam and was part of the original committee which laid the capsule in 1998, assisted them.

Cobram Barooga RSL Sub-branch president Glenn Murphy said that the involvement of the children was part of an aim to get younger people involved in remembering the fallen.