“It’s very easy to be a good citizen in a lovely town like Cowra,” the town’s Citizen of the Year Gerard Farrar said on accepting his award today.
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Gerard Farrar, or Ged to many, was nominated, he suspects by the Cowra Show Society, a organisation he has been involved in for more than 50 years.
A prolific volunteer he is a major part of the annual NSW Dorset Championship, now in its 32nd year, the Cowra Wine Show, St Raphael’s Parish and the NSW Rural Fire Service.
Accepting the award Mr Farrar joked that he felt a little like winter Olympic Games gold medal winner Steven Bradbury who won gold after his fellow competitors were involved in a spectacular fall in the speed skating event final.
“Id like to acknowledge my lovely wife Jacquie,” Mr Farrar said.
“I’m very sure over these many years of doing things for other people she has wondered where the bloody hell I am.”
He also acknowledged the support he has received from his family as well as the parishioners of St Raphael’s Church, Cowra Show Society members and his “elderly” mates.
Looking ahead he paid tribute to Cowra’s young people present at the Australia Day ceremony held in the town’s civic centre.
“It’s been mentioned here today that we do lack volunteers, but when you look at these young people you feel Cowra is in great hands,” he said.
“Volunteering and helping people was it was installed on me first of all by my parents and then as a young man I was in the Apex Club which further enhanced my ability to help people and also the Rural Fire Brigade.
“My life at the Cowra Show Society has been a great deal of pleasure and I thank them and suspect that is where the nomination came from,” he said.
Mr Farrar was a part of the initial Cowra Wine Show team and continues to assist with this event, recently introducing a new category for the 36th annual event.
He has been awarded “Honorary Life Membership” of the Cowra Show Society as a mark of respect for his overwhelming effort.
He is described as the holder of information for the Cowra Show Society – knowing where things are kept, who will need them next, who to contact for particular work, the peculiarities of certain water and electricity connections and the ‘cantankerous cool room’.
The Show Society honoured him by naming a storage shed ‘Ged’s Shed’.
He has been nominated for the Agricultural Societies Council Dedication Award in 2017 and was one of three finalists.
He has been a member of St Raphael’s Parish for his entire life and assisted on the Parish Council, Parish Finance Committee, Catholic Youth Club Executive and was a member of the Parents and Friends Association for many years.
He also maintains the parish grounds, a task he has done for over 20 years.
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