A continual flame toured through the city's streets on Saturday morning, with 20 torch bearers from Orange part of a special 100th year milestone.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
- READ MORE: HELLO WORLD | July babies, 2023
The global Legacy Centenary Torch Relay 2023 starred locally for 7.14 kilometres on July 29, the colour city proudly 19th cab off the rank from 24 cities statewide.
Its first walker and Orange Legacy president, Edward Furze said the event started at the Botanical Gardens, before ending at Robertson Park for the official lighting of the cauldron.
"My father-in-law was involved with Legacy before me and I saw this charity as having an extremely worthy place in society, because we have such a large number of widows in our region," Dr Furze said.
"The Orange area looks after 224 widows with two children under our care, and there are about 107 active legacies in our district, which is one of the largest."
Legacy started in 1923 and continues to support veterans' family members, who continue their lives without their loved ones due to severe injury or death during their service roles.
The charity is based on "a promise" made between diggers back in 1916, which is now a more-than-a-century-old pact after two mates swapped final words in the trenches during World War I.
While the solider was dying from battle wounds, that word of honour was to "look after the missus and the kids".
This is why the total 1300 torch bearers were chosen to represent Legacy Australia in its Oz leg this year - all have personal connections to those who once served for their country.
Presented by Defence Health, the 75-day tour will continue to August 9, finishing up in Queanbeyan, where the torch will have travelled more than 50,000 kilometres.
Reading this on mobile web? Download our news app. It's faster, easier to read and we'll send you alerts for breaking news as it happens. Download in the Apple Store or Google Play.
Sign-up to our latest newsletter:
