When Cameron Baird was in year 6 in 1993, his school did the traditional trip to Canberra, including the Australian War Memorial.
His year 6 teacher and footy coach at Gladstone Views Primary School in Melbourne's north-west was Andrew Harrison or "Mr H".
Mr Harrison remembered well that school trip to Canberra 33 years ago, walking the length of the Roll of Honour at the War Memorial with young Cameron, looking at the names of the 103,000 Australians who had made the ultimate sacrifice.
"For about 10 minutes, we spoke about the names of that wall, the significance of the people on that wall and the contribution of the people on that wall," Mr Harrison said.
No one could have envisaged that one day the name of Corporal Cameron Baird would join the Roll of Honour, the young man killed in action with the 2nd Commando Regiment in Afghanistan on June 22, 2013 at the age of 32, posthumously becoming Australia's 100th Victoria Cross recipient.
"My strongest connection to Cam is at the war memorial," Mr Harrison said.
On Monday, June 22, the 13th anniversary of Cameron's death, the Cameron Baird Foundation was launched at the Australian War Memorial, with friends and family there to celebrate the milestone on an otherwise sombre day.
Mr Harrison is now one of the directors of the foundation. So, too, are Corporal Baird's parents, Doug and Kaye. Good mate from their school days, Rick Green, is another director of the foundation. He reckoned his friend "was already a legend before he joined the army".
"He would talk to everyone and give everyone the time of day," Mr Green said. "It was like he had an old head on his shoulders, even as a kid."
The foundation, now an established charity, will support welfare initiatives for current and former members of the Australian Defence Force.
"It's official. We're up and running. We're good to go and we're very excited about what the future will hold," Mr Harrison said.
"We are going to endeavour to maintain the memory of Cam and promote his legacy and promote the short but amazing life that Cameron had."
Mr Baird, 75, attended the launch at the war memorial. His wife could not due to her health. The Bairds would usually visit the grave of their son on June 22, at a cemetery near their home on the Gold Coast.
Mr Baird was happy to instead hand over the foundation's first donation of $5000 to Invictus Australia chief executive Michael Hartung.
"It is a great honour and a great privilege because we strongly believe in what Invictus is all about," Mr Baird said.
"I know Cameron would have wanted this to be happening as well."
With the federal government cutting a travel allowance to Corporal Baird's parents and funding to Invictus Australia before a community backlash forced the reinstatement of both, was the first donation a pointed one?
"I mean some people might see it like that, but we wanted to do something fairly substantial at the launch and we thought if we can donate $5000 that can go towards supporting 12,500 athletes who are involved in Invictus, we thought Cam would love that," Mr Harrison said.
"When Cam was first killed, the unit did a patch WWBD - What Would Bairdy Do? And they wore that. That's going to be our mantra - 'What would Bairdy do?'. So would Bairdy donate $5000 to Invictus to help 12,500 people? He would."
Looking back to that visit to the Australian War Memorial with young Cameron in 1993, Mr Harrison said the then year 6 student hadn't yet expressed an interest in joining the army.
"We all thought he'd be drafted into the AFL [but for a shoulder injury]," Mr Harrison said. "It was a complete surprise when he made it into the army but not a surprise that he went on to make it into the commandos and then be a Victoria Cross recipient."
Also at the launch was former governor-general General David Hurley and Baird family friend Richard Rolfe.
The launch of the foundation coincided with the opening of the war memorial's new Afghanistan Gallery.
Australian War Memorial director Matt Anderson said the foundation would ensure Corporal Baird's legacy in life would continue after his death.
A portrait of Corporate Baird, by Marcus Wills, originally unveiled in 2022, is already in the collection of the War Memorial, and was displayed at the launch, reminding everyone who was the person behind the name.
