Posts with the Remembrance Day tag

Barris Beat

Making Remembrance Day instructive

Written by Ted Barris on . 1 Comment
Outside the Southwold community centre, the sign invites participants to the annual Remembrance week service.
Outside the Southwold community centre, the sign invites participants to the annual Remembrance week service.

Just before I delivered a Remembrance talk in the southwestern community of Shedden, Ont., last Sunday morning, I walked along the back wall of the Southwold Township Complex, where I was to speak. There were perhaps 500 people waiting for the township’s annual pre-Remembrance Day observance to begin.

And standing politely along that back wall, so that older citizens – principally veterans and their spouses – could have seats, were about 20 young army and air cadets. I made a point of introducing myself to them and learning who they were before I spoke.

“I’m 18 and in the Elgin Regiment,” one of them announced proudly.

“And why did you offer your part-time service?” I asked.

“I wanted to say something about my generation,” he said.

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Barris Beat

Honoured company

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D-Day veteran Don Kerr with Ted Barris, enjoying the reception following the presentations of the Commendation, July 27, 2011.
D-Day veteran Don Kerr with Ted Barris, enjoying the reception following the presentations of the Commendation, July 27, 2011. Photo courtesy Kate Barris.

I walked among heroes, last Wednesday morning – eighteen of them. Several had fought in the Second World War. At least one was a veteran of the Korean War. A number had helped keep the peace in the Middle East, Africa and the Asia. Several others had served Canada as reservists. Almost all were veterans from a theatre of war or world hotspot. But nearly all – after serving Canada in uniform – had accomplished something more that had caught the attention of the Minister of Veterans Affairs.

“After serving,” Minister Steven Blaney said at a recognition ceremony on July 27, “[these] veterans have continued to provide outstanding service to their country, communities and fellow veterans.”

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Barris Beat

Remembrance and the vote

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"The Canadians held on and won at Kapyong because they believed they were the best men on the hill that night," author Dan Bjarnason writes in his book. "And they were right."
"The Canadians held on and won at Kapyong because they believed they were the best men on the hill that night," author Dan Bjarnason writes in his book. "And they were right."

It was just over a decade ago, as I recall. We were on the eve of a different federal election. The membership of the local Royal Canadian Legion had asked me to address the Remembrance Day banquet. I chose to acknowledge veterans of a forgotten war for a forgotten principle. At the branch, that night, was friend and veteran Bud Doucette. I recognized him and those other Canadian volunteers who fought in the Korean War to uphold the peace charter of the United Nations.

“I felt very proud,” former Lance/Corporal Doucette told me that night. “The war and our service have gone pretty much unnoticed.”

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Barris Beat

Psychology of time

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WATCHFACEA few weeks ago, at Centennial College where I teach, we realized things were reaching a breaking point. Students faced a never-ending stream of deadlines. Faculty appeared completely stressed out. And everybody seemed at wit’s end. So, we invited in a campus counsellor to conduct a stress workshop. Eventually, she just asked straight out, “What seems to be the problem?”

“I can’t seem to get things done,” one student said. “There’s never enough time.”

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Barris Beat

Never in November

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Grave of J. Robertson, VC, at Farm.
Grave of James Robertson, VC, who served with the 27th Battalion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. He died Nov. 6, 1917, during the Battle of Passchendaele in Belgium. He was 35.

They tell me if things go a certain way, one day soon I’ll have this day to myself. I’ll be able to rise, take a leisurely breakfast and then do the right thing. They tell me if their plan is accepted, I’ll have all day to pay my respects to Canada’s veterans. That plan will mean I’ll have a statutory holiday on Nov. 11, on Remembrance Day. At least, that’s what the sponsor of a private member’s bill, MPP Lisa MacLeod, believes.

“There’s been an outpouring of support for Canadian soldiers, our war veterans and our war dead,” she told CBC a few days ago.

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Barris Beat

Youth Day

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Moderating one of several candidates' debates (photo by Vanessa Brown).
Moderating one of several candidates' debates (photo by Vanessa Brown).

This was perhaps his only opportunity to address the electorate in a debate for the 2010 municipal election. His competitors for councillor in the ward were in the public hall in person. But municipal candidate Joe Amarelo could not be present. A family emergency had forced him to miss the event. He did, nevertheless, have an impact on the meeting. A statement he’d written was read.

“I see unresolved issues in our town, including vandalism,” Amarelo’s statement read. “It’s important to … create a dialogue. Why not have a Youth Day?”

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Barris Beat

Springtime poppy

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Walter Allward's marble sculpture of Mother Canada mourning her dead at Vimy Ridge memorial site in France.
Walter Allward's marble sculpture of Mother Canada mourning her dead at Vimy Ridge memorial site in France.

About a year ago, I received a letter from a stranger. He had read my book “Victory at Vimy,” the story of Canadians pushing the German Army from its nearly three-year occupation of strategic heights in north-central France. Born in Chile in 1944, the man said he had immigrated to Canada in 1976. In what had clearly been an important step in their lives, Pat Carvacho, his wife and two children became Canadian citizens soon after. Now a semi-retired architect, he wanted to share a dream he had experienced prior to reading my book.

“I saw a soldier of the Great War. I instantly learned his name, Charles Roy,” Carvacho wrote me. “Later (in the dream) I saw this soldier in a trench immediately before an attack, then advancing with his rifle and bayonet. There was a powerful explosion and the rifle and bayonet broke in pieces.”

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