{"id":4587,"date":"2013-11-13T16:46:52","date_gmt":"2013-11-13T21:46:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=4587"},"modified":"2013-11-20T17:42:18","modified_gmt":"2013-11-20T22:42:18","slug":"hundreds-gather-to-remember-the-fallen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/hundreds-gather-to-remember-the-fallen\/","title":{"rendered":"Hundreds gather to Remember the fallen"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hundreds of veterans, dignitaries, and particularly local students and their teachers gathered at the Aurora Cenotaph on a damp and dreary Remembrance Day to pay tribute to the fallen on Monday.<\/p>\n

Some of them had seen active service themselves, some have loved ones still serving in the Canadian Forces, and some were newcomers to Canada with no particular ties to a veteran other than sheer appreciation. But, this week, they all had a common purpose \u2013 to remember. <\/p>\n

\u201cI came out here because my great-grandfather was in the war,\u201d said Ashlin Henderson, a Grade 3 student at St. Joseph Catholic Elementary School. \u201cI came here today because I care about what they did.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ceremonies hit close to home for fellow St. Joseph student, Ella Graham, 11.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe appreciate what they did for us, we respect them and we want them to know we care about what they did,\u201d said Ella, noting her father is still in active service with the Royal Canadian Air Force. <\/p>\n

The north side of the Cenotaph was filled with students from St. Joseph\u2019s craning for the best view of the proceedings, which included wreaths placed by Silver Cross Mother Donna Beek, Newmarket-Aurora MP Lois Brown, MPP Frank Klees, and Mayor Geoffrey Dawe.<\/p>\n

The local school was also well represented at Sunday services, with student Erik Dubeau sounding The Last Post on his bugle. <\/p>\n

For principal Christine Dehaas, being at the Cenotaph on Monday morning achieved more than they could ever hope to in the afternoon services they had planned at the school.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe could never share this at our school,\u201d said Ms. Dehaas. \u201cWe could never bring to them what we just experienced here. It was incredibly powerful, and although we do our best in school to experience this, being a part of it is something I think will have a huge impact on this generation.\u201d
\nMonday\u2019s service, and the luncheon that followed at the Royal Canadian Legion, were the final ceremonies in a busy Remembrance Week to honour our soldiers.<\/p>\n

On Saturday evening, people filled the hall at the Royal Canadian Legion for their annual Poppy Dinner. Led by Ms. Beek, Mayor Dawe, and Legion officials, it was a time to raise a glass and take a moment to appreciate those who had gone before. <\/p>\n

Ms. Beek, who lost her son Corey Hayes in Afghanistan, helped unveil a new memorial plaque honouring the most recent war dead. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn World Wars One and Two, when someone was killed in action, there were millions of them, unlike today being one of only 158,\u201d said Ms. Beek. \u201cIt was almost a daily occurrence. Now, we become temporary VIPs. We\u2019re constantly being called out for monument unveilings [and other] ceremonies and it continuously renews that grief. <\/p>\n

\u201cOn the flipside of that, when you have these kinds of events, and the hundreds of thousands of people who show up for these things, you realise you\u2019re not alone in this. Even though the burden is sometimes unbearable, I look around and I see so many people who truly care, who truly feel and because of this there is a lot of comfort in it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking at the dinner, as well as the two subsequent ceremonies at the Cenotaph, Major Brian Bishop of the Salvation Army underscored the importance of sharing these observances as a collective.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs you look across this room, you see hundreds of people who are here just to celebrate and remember and acknowledge that great price that you personalized as you shared here this evening,\u201d he said. \u201cChrist himself said to love one another and we heard from Donna the importance of sharing that love with one another. I believe it is at times like these that you need that expression of love, not just on Remembrance Day but throughout the year. Be assured of our love and care.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hundreds of veterans, dignitaries, and particularly local students and their teachers gathered at the Aurora Cenotaph on a damp and dreary Remembrance Day to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4572,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_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}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/2013-11-13-10.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1bZ","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-24 18:31:26","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\/4587","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=4587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}