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General News

21 August, 2025

Mr McRae turns 103

Dimboola's gentleman, Ian McRae, has notched up another milestone by celebrating his 103rd birthday on July 19.

By Sheryl Lowe

Former farmer and WWII pilot Ian McRae of Dimboola turns 103, seen here with hand drawn greetings from some of his great-grandchildren.
Former farmer and WWII pilot Ian McRae of Dimboola turns 103, seen here with hand drawn greetings from some of his great-grandchildren.

He enjoyed a quiet celebration with family and received many handmade birthday greetings from much-loved great-grandchildren around the country.

While celebrating his milestone, he recalled that it also coincided with the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.

For the former pilot who left the farm as a teen to follow in his father's footsteps as a veteran of WWI, he said that the day was one of great joy for him and his fellow RAAF enlisted men.

However, he could not forget the lives that were lost when the bomb to end all wars was dropped on Hiroshima.

"It was a sad day in that respect," he said.

"It was supposed to end all wars, and I think, although we see wars continuing in parts of the world, they have not escalated to a world war, and I think perhaps the bomb did that.

"I think it created a degree of fear among leaders and that has prevented another world war."

As a teenager, he would wake up at night after dreaming the Japanese had invaded Australia, and he would see vividly, them coming across the farm towards him.

"I suppose we were all concerned that Australia would be invaded, and without any television and limited radio information, we were left to our imaginations," he said.

At 19, he joined the Air Force because it had more appeal than being in the trenches like his father had.

He thought being in the air was a better alternative.

Having left school at 14, he was limited in the areas he could train in.

He began as an engineer, then became a bomber pilot, and later received flight engineer training.

But a lack of schooling had not deterred the teen.

With the necessary papers signed, presumably by his parents, he progressed through the ranks.

He became an excellent pilot in charge of training cadet navigators and observers at the Mt Gambier RAAF base in preparation for deployment overseas.

"You know, just to show how little we learned about the war, I was in the RAAF training pilots to fight, and yet none of us knew Darwin had been bombed," he said.

"I didn't know until I came home after the war had ended and I had been discharged."

Those days seemed a long time ago until he was invited back to the South East of South Australia to record his memories so they could be preserved for history.

Mr McRae's recollections of days in the RAAF during WWII have now been recorded as part of the history of aviation in the South East.

"They had a control panel in the museum that came out of a plane I had flown, so that was rather exciting to see," he said.

He was flown to Mt Gambier from Nhill in a private plane along with his son Robert and grandson James for the occasion.

A century brings many changes to lifestyle and farming practices, and he has seen a lot, from farming with horse-drawn machinery to tractors and now remotely operated machinery.

"We were one of the last farms in the region to get a tractor, because Dad thought the horses were more reliable, and proved his point when the 10-horse team had to pull the tractor out after becoming bogged in the paddock," he said.

His RAAF training came in handy one day when he misjudged the distance from the tractor to the ground; he did a quick leap and roll as he had learned in training, but this time from a tractor, not a plane.

"He never told us about that one," said son Robert, which sounds as if it may have happened not so long ago.

Mr McRae has never stood still for long, with 21 years as a councillor on the Wimmera Shire Council, the founding member of the Wallup Pipe band remaining a member for 70 years, Rotary for 36 years, Masonic Lodge for 60 years, a Justice of the Peace for 40 years and a committee member for the AH and P Show Society, the Victoria Wheat Board, Shire president for several terms and an avid sports man in football, bowls and golf.

Mr McRae still plays bowls each week and heads off to football to support the Dimboola Roos as often as he can.

He has performed at many shows and special occasions, especially since turning 100.

Attending local events and being a guest on the ABC breakfast program for the recent Steampunk Festival at 7am, and a trip in a hot air balloon at sunrise when he was 101, are features in his many memories.

Mr McRae was born at Wallup and was the guest speaker at the centenary of the hall in 2023.

He spent 30 years maintaining the family homestead, Glenwillan, after moving to Dimboola.

Mr McRae enjoys a drive to Horsham more now that the parking meters have been removed.

He likes to think back over the five-month world trip he took with Janet in 1980, crossing the United States by Greyhound bus and touring Europe, including Scotland, where his ancestors hailed from in the 1840s.

Mr McRae considers himself fortunate to enjoy a close relationship with his son, Robert, and that they found an easy way to transition the farm from Ian to Robert while still being involved.

"Robert is now doing that with his son, and this transition is important to generational farming," he said.

"We don't do it to be rich; it is a way of life."

When asked for any pearls of wisdom he could pass on, he just smiled and said his life had been a wonderful one and credited his much-loved late wife Janet and their family for that.

"In our 75 years together, Janet and I never fought," he said.

"We may have disagreed on some things, but we never fought.

"But in saying that, we never really held hands a lot, but the last time I visited her in Natimuk, where she had been in care for a short time, she held my hand tightly and didn't want to let go.

"She passed away a few hours later."

Ian and Janet were centenarians together for 12 days.

She turned 100 on Christmas Eve in 2023 and sadly died 12 days later.

He said that marrying Janet in 1948 was the best thing he had done in life, and losing her was the hardest.

They enjoyed three children together, Rob, Alison and Pam, seven grandchildren, and eleven great-grandchildren.

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