The fact that he lived 1000 kilometres away in Leongatha, in south-eastern Victoria, didn't faze him. A new book tells the true story of how one February day, with his parents' blessing, he set off on what was to be a four-month odyssey with his pony, Ginger Mick.

The book Lennie the Legend: Solo to Sydney By Pony, to be published by the National Library of Australia on February 1, tells how Lennie was feted at towns he and Ginger Mick stopped at such as Lakes Entrance, Cooma, and Bowral.

"It was the middle of the Depression, people were looking for good news stories, so it captured the public imagination," author Stephanie Owen Reeder said.

Lennie and Ginger Mick followed bush tracks and barely formed dirt roads east to Cann River then north to Canberra. Horse and boy survived a deranged tramp jumping out at them a few days into their ride, a bushfire near Traralgon, heavy rain and fogs.

In the fledgling town of Canberra, where sheep grazed in front of (now Old) Parliament House, Lennie shook prime minister Joseph Lyons' hand, and took tea in the members' refreshment rooms.

Arriving In Sydney's Martin Place, Lennie and Ginger Mick were mobbed by the public and the press. Lennie met the lord mayor at Sydney Town Hall, visited Circular Quay and Bondi Beach and rode an elephant at Taronga Zoo.

And on March 19, Lennie and Ginger Mick took part in the Sydney Harbour Bridge opening pageant, crossing the bridge among indigenous groups, war veterans, schoolchildren and bridge workers and saluting the governor-general and the NSW premier.

On March 21, at a match at the Sydney Cricket Ground, Lennie met his idol, Donald Bradman, who gave him a a signed cricket bat.

Lennie convinced his father that he should ride Ginger Mick home. Back in Leongatha on June 10, a huge crowd turned out in the main street. More than 800 people attended a civic reception.

Reeder says Lennie being allowed to ride to Sydney amazed her, given "these days a nine-year-old child is probably not even allowed to walk to the shops by themselves".

The ride came about when Lennie's father, Leo Tennyson Gwyther, a decorated World War I hero with chronic war injuries, broke his leg on the Gwyther farm in South Leongatha.

While he was in hospital, Lennie completed the ploughing and saved the crops. A thankful Leo asked how he could reward Lennie, and all he wanted was to see the majestic bridge in Sydney he had read about. Lennie mapped the route himself.

This week, South Gippsland shire councillor Bob Newton called for a statue of Lennie and Ginger Mick to be erected in Leongatha, and for more children to be told the story.

"It is one of the great stories of Leongatha, but probably never recognised too much. It was an amazing achievement for someone to ride all that way. Unbelievable."

Ginger Mick lived to the age of 27 on the Gwyther farm. Lennie went on to marry, have a daughter and settle in the Melbourne suburb of Hampton.

He worked as an experimental engineer at General Motors' Holden plant at Fishermans Bend, and also was a keen fisherman, astronomer, ice skater, and sailor.

At the time of his death, aged 70 in 1992, he was building a  yacht, which he planned to sail to Tasmania and New Zealand.

Lennie's daughter, Mary Gwyther, said a statue would be a good way to honour his "wonderful achievement" in the 1932 ride to Sydney.

Granddaughter Sally Gwyther said young people would be inspired by the book.

Sally, who was 17 when Lennie died, remembers him "always being very creative". "He had a lathe in the shed and he was always turning wood or making tools or tables. There wasn't really anything he couldn't do. I'm sure he would have attempted sailing around the world, that's how adventurous he was."