Richard retires his 40-year journey at Wangarang

Wangarang Chairman Gary Norton, Richard Thirkell and Orange Mayor Reg Kidd.

Richard Thirkell began his career at Wangarang Industries in 1981 at the tender age of 15 years old, now 40 years later, he’s officially retiring.

“I would like to say thank you to Wangarang for letting me work here for the last 4 decades. I don’t know where the time has gone. I really enjoyed myself working here and made a lot of friends,” Richard stated in his farewell speech.

Congratulations were made for his significant professional milestone by his fellow colleagues, Wangarang board members, and visitors such as Orange Mayor Reg Kidd.

“To work in a business for 40 years is absolutely unbelievable. On behalf of Orange City Council and the community of Orange – we wish you all our best wishes in retirement,” Cr Reg Kidd said.

During his time at Wangarang, Richard’s covered various types of work from woodwork, woolpacks, Electrolux component assembly to mailing and packaging processes to state a few examples.

Richard also served as a Safety Committee Member and had a role in Quality Control while at Wangarang.

Over the years, Richard would play guitar on the last day of work every year, which will be dearly missed by his colleagues.

“To talk about my time here at Wangarang thoroughly, might take me another 40 years to tell everyone about it,” Richard said with a laugh.

Richard shared a lovely story where the employees would stop work if it were a nice sunny day outside and they would head out onto the grass and play a match of cricket for half-hour. Certainly, being one of Richard’s fondest memories while working at Wangarang.

Orange City Life congratulates Richard for his dedicated work at Wangarang and the contribution he has made to our community for 40 years. We wish Richard the best in his well-deserved retirement.