Sam Farraway MLC and Parkes Mayor Ken Keith OAM at the 2019 Parkes Elvis Festival.

The Parkes Elvis Festival will return in top gear next April thanks to $160,000 in funding from the NSW Government.

“The NSW Regional Events Acceleration Fund will help next year’s Parkes Elvis Festival deliver a bigger program of events, inspired by the 1968 movie classic Speedway,” said Parliamentary Secretary to the Deputy Premier Sam Farraway MLC.

Parkes Elvis Festival Director Cathy Treasure is very excited about the funding that will go towards theming around Speedway.
“We have some fabulous things planned including a Speedway car show, a specially themed opening concert and a themed disability viewing platform in Cooke Park.”

She said the funding enabled them to bring new styles of entertainment to the festival. “We are very happy to be part of the program to bring back big events.”

Cathy said the reaction to the new date of the festival had been overwhelmingly positive. “We have been able to sell to a new target market. The reaction has just been brilliant.”

The multi-award-winning Parkes Elvis Festival was moved from its traditional date in early January to coincide with Elvis’ birthday, to 20-24 April next year because of the COVID situation.

Jenny Freeman, Barbara Hughes, Suzie McNamara and Beth Thomas won their bridge games last Thursday.

One maxim in the game of bridge is ‘Cover an honour with an honour!’ The five highest cards in bridge – ace, king, queen, jack, ten – are known as honours. If an honour is led, the common rule is to play a higher honour to cover that honour.

Sometimes a player will stubbornly refuse to part with a good honour, but by looking at the bigger picture you see that you are not wasting an honour, instead you are promoting a lower ranked card to potentially take a trick. Covering an honour with an honour can work brilliantly in most situations of play.

Honourable winners the past week were: Margaret Hawken and Jill Crisp on Tuesday; Suzie McNamara with Beth Thomas, and Jenny Freeman with Barbara Hughes on Thursday; Bev Laing and Anne Berkeley on Monday.

If you are interested in bridge, go to www.parkes.bridge-club.org or call Kevin Robinson 0429 621 712.

The 30m high war memorial on Memorial Hill in Parkes stands out from the average statue in the town square, and was part of the memorable World War II reunion in 2004 of soldiers who trained at the RAAF base in Parkes.

Seventeen years ago former prime minister Gough Whitlam was part of a record breaking crowd in Parkes to celebrate Anzac Day as part of a World War II reunion.

The theme for the reunion of soldiers who trained at the RAAF base in Parkes was ‘They Were Here’.

During WW2, Parkes airport became RAAF Base Parkes, accommodating No.1 Air Navigation School, No.2 Wireless Air Gunners School, No.8 Operational Training Unit and after the war No.87 SQN operated from Parkes. The former prime minister did his training in Parkes in 1943 before serving in the Pacific.

Organiser of the reunion and secretary of the Parkes RSL at the time, Arthur Parker, still have very fond memories of the event and is wondering where they are now. He added that most of the soliders had since died, including Gough Whitlam who passed away on 21st October 2014 at age 98.

Among the hundreds of people who attended the reunion weekend were also ex Italian interns and their families.

Arthur said while the weekend took months of organising, it was all worth it. The programme ran over three days from Friday, 23rd to Sunday, 25th April 2004.

The program on Friday included a Morse Code display, a street parade and flyover and a civic reception at Council chambers with children singing wartime songs.

Saturday included visits to the Parkes Radio Telescope, Parkes cemetery with a short commemorative service and a visit to Parkes airport and barbeque lunch. There was a Catholic Anzac service before a reunion dinner at the Parkes Services Club and wartime songs performed by a group of Parkes singers.

On Sunday the Anzac Day program started with the usual dawn service at Memorial Hill, followed by a breakfast at the Parkes Services Club before the program continued in Cooke Park at the cenotaph.

Beryl Westcott (left) went to the pop-up clinic in Parkes this week for her second vaccination. Her daughter Elizabeth Westcott, who is fully vaccinated, went with her. They wanted to get vaccinated to look after their health, protect their family and to be able to get the freedoms fully vaccinated people will enjoy from 11th October.

While the Parkes Shire has been fortunate to come out of lockdown after five weeks, the rest of NSW will begin to reopen soon when it reaches the 70% double dose vaccination target.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said while high vaccination rates were the key factor in the roadmap to recovery, COVID-19 would continue to circulate in the community.

Some of the key public health advice for the general community from 11th October will be:

• Everyone, vaccinated and not vaccinated, is urged to get tested if you have any symptoms and immediately self-isolate until a negative result is received.

• Whether you are vaccinated or not vaccinated, if you test positive you must self-isolate for 14 days.

• Close contacts will include household members of positive cases and close social contacts.

• If you are a close contact of a positive case and vaccinated, you must get tested and self-isolate for seven days. On day six, you must get tested again. If it is negative and you are well, you can end isolation after day seven. For the following seven days you must work from home where practicable.

• If you are a close contact and not vaccinated you must get tested and immediately self-isolate for 14 days. On day 12, you should get tested again. If it is negative, you can end isolation after day 14.

• The Service NSW QR code check-in system will remain in place in the general community.

• People aged 16 years and over will only be allowed entry into some venues if fully vaccinated, and people with emptions. Children under 16 will have to be accompanied by a fully vaccinated member of their household to enter hospitality venues, non-critical retail stores, personal services, sporting, recreation and entertainment facilities and events. Critical retail such as supermarkets and pharmacies will still be accessible to those not fully vaccinated.

Visit nsw.gov.au for the latest information.

Parkes photographer Marc Payne was out on the weekend and managed to capture the moment when the sun broke through the cloud cover and lit up the sky and the side of the Tichborne wheat silos. “The silos are a strong subject when you get the right conditions,” he said. If you have an iconic or local image for Closing Shot send it to the editor@parkesphoenix.com.au.