Brantford plaque unveiling for 100th anniversary of WWI Internment

What an honour it was to be part of the wave of plaque unveilings across the country on Friday at 11am, commemorating the 100th anniversary of Canada’s first national internment operations. The hundred plaques project, known as CTO (Ukrainian for 100) was the brainchild of Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk and was organized and funded by the Canadian First World War Internment Recognition Fund.

Since there were only 100 plaques for the entire country, as soon as I heard about this project, I put Brantford down for one. Here’s what the plaques look like:

 

STO plaque image

There were about 80 people in attendance, many driving in from Toronto and Cambridge including people of Alevi and Armenian heritage. The prayers and hymns were a moving tribute to those who had been unjustly imprisoned by Canada one hundred years ago. Both priests spoke eloquently, as did our government representatives.

What sets Canada apart from many countries is that we do acknowledge injustices. That’s what these 100 plaques are all about — commemorating a past injustice so it will never be repeated.

btfdcto
The Very Reverend Father Bohdan Mironovich of the Ukrainian Catholic Church of St. John, The Reverend Father Vartan Tashjian of the Armenian Apostolic Church of Montreal, author Marsha Skrypuch, Dr. John Skrypuch, the Honourable Dave Levac, MPP for Brant and Speaker of the Ontario Legislature, the Honourable Phil McColeman, MP for Brant, Sub-Deacon Paul Vandervet, Diane Martyniuk.

 

Brantford’s plaque

 

Marsha’s Forest of Reading exciting Monday!

I got home from Book Week late Saturday afternoon, had one day to do laundry and rest, then on Monday, drove to London for their first Forest of Reading event. It was held at the Western Fair Grounds and the volunteers were absolutely spectacular, thinking of EVERYTHING.

 

 

 

 

The audience! 1900 strong!

In London, I won the Silver Birch non-fiction award, David Carroll won the Silver Birch fiction award, and Eric Walters won the Red Maple. Here’s the stunningly amazingly beautiful plaque I was given:

 

 

 

 

 

 

I gave it to Tuyet, who was THRILLED:

She and her husband are also holding footstep shaped letters from the students of Our Lady of Lourdes.

There was lots of news coverage for the London event. Like this article on CTV. And this one in the London paper. And this CTV video.

 

 

Our Lady of Lourdes — May 1st visit

Had a great day on Thursday at Our Lady of Lourdes in Delaware Ontario. I’m here with Marisa Zammit, OLOL librarian, but also a fabulous writer. I am anxious for Marisa to finish her WWII novel! Several of her students are avid writers too. I think a writing club is in the future for OLOL, just saying….

This was Marisa’s reaction to talk of a writers’ club at OLOL. <G>

 

So much fun to present at the 2014 MASC Young Authors’ Conference

Here are all of us MASC presenters, from left to right: Martin Springett, Art Slade, Ruth Ohi, Vikki VanSickle, me, Richard Scrimger, Marthe Jocelyn, Lesley Livingston.

Here is me, with Art Slade, the world’s fastest talker. We were each given 2 minutes to introduce ourselves and Art delivered his auctioneer style. You should have seen the look of awe on the kids’ faces!

MASC was held from Tuesday to Thursday at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum — a FABULOUS venue! On the Monday before, I presented at two Ottawa library branches, plus gave a presentation for the local Ukrainian community.