Exactly 100 years ago, the first soldier from a sleepy town south-west of Sydney enlisted in the Light Horse Brigade of the Australian Army.
Twenty-year-old George Illey Dunn from Mount Hunter would go on to fight through the horrors of Gallipoli and the Middle East during World War I.
Twenty years later he would return to the front in World War II.
On Friday, students at Mount Hunter Primary School marked the 100th anniversary of the beginning of Dunn's journey to the shores of Gallipoli.
To commemorate the centenary, students in years 5 and 6 published a book on the sacrifice he and 39 other members of the Mount Hunter community made between 1914 and 1918.
The students also restored a memorial to the soldiers that sits just outside the gates of the school, with the help of Wollondilly Shire Council and a federal government grant.
"We owe a huge debt to these diggers and their families," said Mount Hunter principal and years 3 to 6 teacher, Karina Shepherd.
"They were only a few years older than the kids who wrote this book."
The kids dug through archives, made contact with family members and combined all their research into an anthology of the soldiers' lives.
"We learnt a lot about how young some of the diggers were, it's scary to think that they had to relive all the terrible images in their minds," said 12-year-old Chantel Wright.
Prior to the release of the book, few in Mount Hunter knew anything about the names on the memorial that sits at the entrance to the weatherboard town – it has changed little since George Dunn first enlisted.
"It will mean that the names on the memorial don't just become names," said army Captain Nick Hornbuckle.
"People say we don't have customs or traditions, but this is our history," said Sergeant Major Tony Lynch. "The Light Horse is particularly important for rural communities, where most of the servicemen came from."