Fairymount Festival 1985
by Brendan Gibson The 1985 Kyogle Fairymount Festival was a great opportunity for the Kyogle Nuclear Disarmament Group. We covered my brother’s baby-blue 4WD with placards saying things like ‘NORCO won’t buy radioactive milk’. I sat on the bonnet with my arms inside my shirt and a sign tucked under my chin: ‘Mr Disarmament 1985’. As […]
Kyogle Bazaar
by Sandii Davie I was there when Kyogle Bazaar faced closure. In 2017 I was a stallholder for Kyogle Bazaar when management could no longer continue. Nobody wanted this little rural creative arts hub to fail. I stepped up and became coordinator. I found my happy place where the community gathers to share our passions […]
Cross Cultural Awareness Festival
by Uncle Andrew Johnston I was there in 1996, helping organise a Cross Cultural Awareness Festival in Kyogle. At that time I had been playing in bands for several years, but during this festival I had the biggest thrill of my life, to that stage. This was being invited to support Uncle Jimmy Little on stage for […]
Kyogle, Casino, Coraki, Woodburn and Lismore
by Shane Runciman We live in a region that is used to floods, but everyone knew this was different. I was there. With a team of 80 beautiful volunteers over the first week we prepared and delivered 3,000 meals over five days throughout Kyogle, Casino, Coraki, Woodburn and Lismore. The priority was people of lower socio-economic […]
The Nursery
by Paul Daley I WAS (T)HERE in 1989. At sunrise the flood had reached the third London Plane tree just up towards the nursery from the old low-level bridge. This was the first bridge to be built in Kyogle back in 1907. Before this flood, I remember driving over it in our yellow Mitsubishi van […]
The Lost World Wilderness
by Paul Daley I WAS (T)HERE in 1998, late October. The Lost World Wilderness. The heart of the largest expanse of sub-tropical rainforest in Australia – right on our back doorstep. A prehistoric living relic of deep time ecology. We walked with packs and food and tents and snacks from Antarctic Beech in the Border […]
Kyogle 2002
by Paul Daley I WAS (T)HERE in Kyogle in 2002. Half a lifetime ago. 16 years old out on the town with the boys. Talk of a paddock basher. $200 for an unregistered car. With friends from Lismore visiting, and after last weekend’s experience, I felt to sit this one out. The following morning in […]
Drought
by Liam Dau – Age 11, Urbenville Public School I WAS THERE when the shots rang out in echoes across our valley. Our herd we had worked were like skeletons, just hide hanging like clothes on a coat hanger. The grass long gone, turned to dust, brown choking dust, in our hair, our clothes, hearts. […]
Mt Lindesay
by Gabby McGrath – Age 10, Urbenville Public School I WAS THERE, in the smoke-filled air, coughing and spluttering. It felt hard to breathe. Dry grass, fallen logs and weeds of all kinds, all kindling for the beast of flames that consumed Mt Lindsay. Sirens blasting in my ears, sounds and smells around me I […]
Flooding
by Hunter Paget – Age 11, Urbenville Public School I WAS THERE when Lismore was flooding. I lost all my boyhood possessions and it was really sad when it flooded. Some people drowned in the floods. That was heartbreaking. When Lismore dried up a lot of houses were destroyed and many roads were washed away, […]