THERE’S a house along Echuca’s High St, looking a little forlorn, a little lost and lonely.
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The lights don’t come on anymore; clearly there’s no-one home.
Cliff Spiers used to live there, but the man whose life was divided into three chapters, has decided to start a new one.
The Spiers’ story – like so many Australians of his vintage – can be simply summed up as life before the war, the war, and life after the war.
Cliff’s story is no Boy’s Own tale. He was determined his life should not be defined by war. But his commitment to service for decades after the shooting stopped is a symbol of the real Cliff Spiers – his legacy if you like.
Along the way the gregarious veteran is now considered ‘almost’ a local – he’s been in Echuca 48 years – and in that time he also became something of a fixture as the MC you had to have at just about any gathering as he knew everything about everyone and was in his own class as a public speaker.
Not so long ago the 98-year-old, who lived in his own home, had opted for a couple of weeks respite at Wharparilla Lodge and decided he liked it so much it has officially become his new address.
For one of the very few Echuca-Moama World War II veterans, Cliff still carries the baton for them all, especially for November 11.
Asked about its importance to him; he has never hesitated: “It is everything. It remembers the ones we lost. I’ll always remember them, especially when the Last Post is played”, Cliff said.
Sadly, he has many, too many to remember.
Some of them still raw, all these years later. Such as the bomber crew he ‘lost’ in North Africa.
“I was in Benghazi and my crew had an early morning flight and we had to have about five or six of us to get the plane ready,” Cliff recalled.
“And he took off, and I’ll never forget it, I said to him: ‘George Liles, I’ll see you when you come back, George’.
“I knew the whole crew, the whole four of them. We waited eight-and-a-half hours and they didn’t turn up.
“They went in somewhere and we don’t know for certain; but it could be in the Mediterranean but we’ll never know what happened, all we knew was they were lost.
“That was a Baltimore, on a bombing run that day. One thing they never told us, ever, was where they were flying to.
“We lost a lot of crews. I haven’t got the exact figures, but we lost a lot of crews.”
Before Cliff’s idyllic Victorian country lifestyle was confronted with war it was another world, one with which he is still fascinated comparing the good old days in another century with everything around him today.
“Everything has changed so much over the years, things like transport especially,” he said.
“I remember when I went to school before the buses came into service in 1938. I’d ride there on a pony, and then a bicycle.
“In a head wind it would take around an hour-and-a-half to complete the ride, so it was always nice getting a tail wind as it’d only take an hour and be a less draining ride,” he laughed.
But he got used to the internal combustion engine without any hesitation – he still had a driver’s licence when he bought a new car in 2017.
When old enough to enlist, Cliff joined the Royal Australian Air Force and went to war.
Returning in one piece he married his sweetheart Audrey and moving to Rosedell, the family farm at Bamawm Extension where they lived until retiring to Echuca in 1972, where they enjoyed dancing at balls and district functions.
With basic training in Shepparton and Mildura before being posted overseas, Cliff would serve in the UK, North Africa and the Italian campaign, where he was based at Udine, the Allied airfield which was the closest to the frontline.
As a fitter he would work on most of the planes used by the Allies – fighters including the Spitfire and Hurricane and the bombers, medium bombers right through to the legendary Lancasters.
And it was at Udine he was still serving when the atom bombs fell. The Japanese surrendered and the war was over – although Cliff would not get home until the next year.
Where he went straight back to the farm; almost as if he had never been away.
But Cliff’s service had just begun – it simply made a seamless transition from the military to the community.
He would become a long-term Masonic Lodge member, dedicate decades to Legacy, helping the families of those who did not make it home; and he would go on to be a founding member of the Rich River Golf Club. Wherever you turned, Cliff was in some way on the job, helping out.
But while Cliff still considers himself just an ordinary, friendly bloke, even he still gets a kick out of what he has described as “one of the highlights and special moments of my life; receiving the Citizen of the Year Award for Campaspe Shire in 2002 for the work I had done for charities in the region and the community itself”.
“I think attitude is the key to being able to live life to the fullest and enjoy it as much as possible – if you have a good attitude and outlook on life then you’ll be able to enjoy every one of its moments,” he added.
“I wake up every morning and extract as much joy out of each day as I can.”
Who can argue? It’s worked for 98 years.