FOR Phil Spielvogel, Anzac Day was the most important date on the calendar. And despite failing health, he was able to make one last appearance at this year's Anzac Day service at Meredith.His reward when he entered the Meredith RSL Hall was a standing ovation.Just a day later, at Ballarat's Kiralee Nursing Home, Mr Spielvogel passed away. He was 93.Son Thomas said his father "always had a twinkle in his eye" and never argued with anyone."He had a million friends and he didn't have enemies," he said."Anyone he didn't like he didn't bother with."Mr Spielvogel was born in Ballarat, the grandson of well-known local historian Nathan Spielvogel. After returning from service in World War II, he and wife Mavis were married. They would share a partnership of more than 60 years, before she died in 2007.Mr Spielvogel also opened a photographic store in Ballarat.But his life took a different turn a couple of years later, when Mavis' father died and the couple took over the sheep farm he had run at Morrisons."My grandfather had worked his guts out for us to have a farm, so they couldn't sell it," Thomas said. There Philip and Mavis worked until they were well into their 80s.Mr Spielvogel was renowned for his community service. "Dad was involved in everything," Thomas recalled.From foundation membership of the Morrisons Rural Fire Brigade to his involvement in the Ballarat Synagogue, he was part of it.From the 1970s to the early 1990s he served on the former Ballan Shire Council and was shire president three times.He was against the merger of the Ballan and Bacchus Marsh shires that saw the creation of the Moorabool Shire. "He was totally opposed to that. He couldn't see how it could possibly work," Thomas said.Instead, he thought his own municipality would have blended better with the Golden Plains Shire.After returning from the war, he dedicated his life to the RSL and Legacy. "He always had a legacy widow he looked after and made sure the kids got the same treatment as if they had a father."And for his efforts in the RSL, he was afforded the rare honour of life membership.As a member of the RSL state council he had voted each year for many years to have monuments for Vietnam Veterans to be added to war memorials across the state.Each year he was defeated"(To him) no-one else was to judge if it was a good war or not, it was the fact you were there and went through it," Thomas said.One year, he did not bring it up. Afterwards, his friend and then RSL state president Bruce Ruxton asked if he had gone soft on the Vietnam issue."He said, `No Bruce, we're going to have one at Meredith anyway'."A few weeks later, Mr Ruxton attended the ceremony to officially dedicate the memorial. Soon, other memorials followed at sites around the state."That was a big win he had and he was very very proud of it."