{"id":29297,"date":"2021-05-14T00:10:56","date_gmt":"2021-05-14T04:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=29297"},"modified":"2021-05-14T00:10:59","modified_gmt":"2021-05-14T04:10:59","slug":"publics-help-sought-in-designing-korean-war-memorial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/publics-help-sought-in-designing-korean-war-memorial\/","title":{"rendered":"Public\u2019s help sought in designing Korean War Memorial"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It has been a passion project for local historians and veterans, and now the public\u2019s help is being sought to make the dream a reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Town of Aurora, in conjunction with the Aurora branch of the Royal Canadian Legion, is looking for the public\u2019s feedback on a memorial to the Korean War, one which will be placed at the Aurora Peace Park alongside the Cenotaph honouring the residents of Aurora, King, and Whitchurch who fell in the First World War, the Altar of Sacrifice commemorating local men who lost their lives in the Second World War, and the decommissioned LAV placed there to remember the men and women who served in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are asking the public to submit their design ideas for a fitting monument to honour the soldiers from Aurora, King and Whitchurch-Stouffville who fought in the Korean War,\u201d said the Town of Aurora in a statement. \u201cThe winning design will be submitted as part of a grant application to Veterans Affairs Canada\u2019s Commemorative Partnership Program for Community War Memorial funding to cover some of the costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAmateur artists are welcome to submit. This design call-out is open to any resident of Aurora, King or Whitchurch-Stouffville. We are looking for concept drawings that can be as simple as a pencil sketch to provide the inspiration and general idea for a suitable memorial rather than formal design drawings and specifications. The memorial should not contain any names of soldiers who fought in the war and must be in both English and French.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The top three memorial designs submitted by the deadline of May 28 will be placed on the Town\u2019s online communications platform, Engage Aurora, for public input and voting on the preferred design. The designer behind the winning submission will be invited to unveil the monument once it is completed and receive a gift card of $250.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRemembrances of Canada\u2019s contribution to the Korean War effort can be found in many municipalities across this country,\u201d said the Town. \u201cAurora\u2019s War Memorial Peace Park solemnly pays tribute to those\u2026 who served and were lost in the two World Wars and the Afghan war. There is, however, no similar recognition of the Korean War.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Korean War memorial was first pitched to Aurora Council this past winter by local historian Bill Newman, who was inspired to pursue the project after a visit to Seoul in 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While there, he toured the demilitarized zone (DMZ) and took in memorials recognizing the conflict, including a memorial to Canada\u2019s contributions at the Korean War Memorial and Museum. When he came back home, he realized there wasn\u2019t that same recognition in his hometown and began his research with an assist from the Aurora Museum & Archives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, memorials to Canada\u2019s contributions to the Korean War can be found at monuments from coast to coast, but Aurora is one of the exceptions. Although no Aurorans are known to have lost their lives in the conflict, Mr. Newman says it is \u201ctimely and fitting\u201d to recognize what they did to fend off \u201cyet another threat to the freedom and right of self-determination of the world\u2019s peoples.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are requesting through this presentation the involvement of the Town and its staff to design and locate a fitting memorial at the Peace Park to our Korean War veterans,\u201d he said. \u201cWe understand the funding for the memorial may be obtainable through Veterans Affairs Canada\u2019s commemorative partnership program for a community war memorial funding. Your favourable consideration of this request would provide overdue recognition to those from our community and surrounding area who served in what is being termed as \u2018Canada\u2019s forgotten war.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen one of the Legion members heard about this proposal to Council, he remarked with almost a tear in his eye, \u2018This is for you, dad.\u2019 May we always remember them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more information on the project, visit engageaurora.ca\/koreanwarmemorial.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong>
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It has been a passion project for local historians and veterans, and now the public\u2019s help is being sought to make the dream a reality. The Town of Aurora, in conjunction with the Aurora branch of the Royal Canadian Legion, is looking for the public\u2019s feedback on a memorial to the Korean War, one which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-7Cx","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-24 22:38:40","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29297\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}