ANZAC DAY 2014
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A book by two Illawarra authors will be presented to Prince William and Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge at an Anzac Day ceremony at the Australian War Memorial.
The children's book, Lone Pine, was written by teachers Susie Brown and Margaret Warner and tells the story of a soldier named Benjamin Smith, who fought at the battle of Lone Pine.
He sent a pine cone home to his mother in Inverell, who planted a few seeds. All the lone pines planted across the country are descendants of this tree.
The Lone Pine book will be presented to the royal couple as part of a gift from the war memorial.
Ms Brown came up with the idea when she realised Prince William would be planting a lone pine at the war memorial.
She worked out it was a relative of the prince's - his great-grandfather's brother, The Duke of Gloucester - who planted the first pine at the memorial in 1934.
"I thought, I wonder if he knows about that? Wouldn't it be great if he could read the story?
"We thought, why not see if we could donate a copy of the book to them."
After contacting the director of the war memorial and then the Prime Minister's Department, their offer was accepted so the pair sent a signed copy of the book to Canberra.
However, the authors didn't receive an invitation to the ceremony.
"That's the only way it could be better, if we could actually present it ourselves," Ms Brown said.
"We had to provide all of our details with the book so maybe we'll get a letter of acknowledgement at some point, which would be nice."
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