A MEMORIAL to World War I serviceman and Australian flying ace Bert Hinkler will soon be unveiled at the site of his death on Mount Pratomagno near Florence, Italy, due in large part to the efforts of Capalaba resident Kevin Lindeberg.
Until recently, Mr Lindeberg was the only Australian who knew where Hinkler's de Havilland Puss Moth crashed, killing the flying ace in the Italian Alps in 1933, and where his body was found.
Mr Lindeberg said he was studying opera in London in 1974 when his long association with Queensland Museum librarian and aviation historian Ted Wixted led to him becoming part of the drive to preserve Hinkler's memory in England, Australia and Italy; and he also helped relocate Hinkler's house in Southampton to his home town of Bundaberg in 1983.
Mr Lindeberg said he walked the trail up Mount Pratomagno in 1974 to see Hinkler's crash site and was accommodated there by Arezzo Aero Club president the Duke of Aosta, who connected him carbon collector Gino Tocchioni - the man who found Hinkler's body in 1933.
Mr Lindeberg said he placed a marker at the crash site and a second marker where Hinkler's body was found, and was called upon last year to help identify the two sites.
He said although one marker was missing, the other was still high in a tree, helping him to formally identify the site where the aviator died.
Mr Lindeberg said he had since received state government funding to help establish the monument to Hinkler, which would form part of the Italian Alpine Club Arezzo Branch's 8.4km mountain trekking path, to be called The Hinkler Ring.
"The centrepiece of the new Memorial Monument is a 1.4 tonne basalt boulder," he said.
"It has been transported free-of-charge by Toll Group 16,000km from Mon Repos Beach at Bundaberg in Queensland, where Hinkler first flew in his homemade glider in 1912.
"The Memorial Monument will also commemorate the three World War I Allies of Italy, Great Britain and Australia coming together again after 100 years to honour Hinkler and other World War I compatriots who fought for peace in the Great War."
Mr Lindeberg said the unveiling ceremony, which has been endorsed as a Queensland Government-funded World War I Anzac Centenary Commemorative Special Event, would be held in Italy on August 2 and attended by the Australian ambassador the Hon. Mike Rann.
The memorial will also include a time capsule buried in the base of the monument and will include letters from Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.
Mr Lindeberg called Hinkler a great Australian who "believed in flight and that it could be a safe way for people to travel around the world".
"It required people like him and (Sir Charles Kingsford-Smith) to put their lives on the line to develop aviation," he said.
Mr Lindeberg, who will attend the unveiling ceremony, will leave for Italy later this month.
