Poppy Street Appeal returns to city
The RSA is again asking Kiwis to pop on a poppy in memory of our fallen soldiers and open their wallets to support those who returned.
The annual Poppy Appeal, New Zealand’s oldest continuous street appeal, raised nearly $2 million throughout New Zealand last year.
RSA welfare officer Michael O’connor said more than $20,000 of this was raised in Palmerston North, but they aimed to beat that total this year.
On Friday, RSA members will join scouts, pupils and soldiers from Linton Military Camp to hit the streets in an attempt to do just that. ‘‘Poppy Day is the day of the year we get our money for the RSA’S welfare fund, so we want to make the best of it,’’ O’connor said.
His main job was organising weekly visits for veterans in hospitals and rest homes. The fund helped to pay for care packages and transport, but it also provided financial support for exservicemen who needed help with unexpected medical expenses, food or rent.
O’connor said organising the appeal would be an impossible task without the RSA’S dedicated members, including the club’s longest serving collector Pat Hickton.
The 96-year-old WWII veteran has been one of the club’s top collectors for almost 40 years. He has a reputation as bit of a character and has been charming shoppers into donating outside the Pak’n Save every Poppy Day for 15 years.
Hickton will be back at it again on Thursday evening and all day on Friday. Not even a motorcycle crash could keep him away. And that’s not metaphorical, as O’connor said Hickton was recovering from one this Christmas.
Hickton said he was looking forward to getting out there. He loves the variety of people he gets to meet and seeing generosity spring from surprising sources.
‘‘But it is always sad when we come to Poppy Day. You can’t help but think, why did I come back when so many of the jokers I went away with never did? That’s why I do this, to remember them. It’s something to give back, because I came back.’’