Royal Canadian Air Force veteran Dot Proulx was so modest about her wartime service that she wouldn't allow me to publish this until after her death. She passed away on November 20, 2022 at the age of ninety-nine, and I am honoured to share her story at last.
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These ten wonderful wartime women, four of them still living, volunteered to serve their countries in World War Two. Please read their stories and remember our veterans, today and always.
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Willa Walker rose rapidly through the ranks in 1941 to become head of the newly-formed Royal Canadian Air Force Women’s Division. Only 28 years old, grieving the recent death of her baby son, her husband locked away in a German prison camp, Willa rose to the challenge with courage and dignity, breaking down barriers for future generations of women […]
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Named for the future British prime minister, 100-year-old Winston Churchill Parker of Okotoks, Alberta, joined the Royal Canadian Air Force, served as a Wireless Air Gunner in a Wellington bomber, was shot down on his unlucky thirteenth mission, and spent the rest of the war as a WW2 POW in a German prison camp. Note […]
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Jean Hubbard joined the Canadian Women’s Army Corps (CWAC) on the day she turned eighteen. Wearing her red and white polka-dotted dress, she is likely the only recruit ever welcomed into the armed forces with a birthday cake!
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Here is one of the reasons they call it The Greatest Generation. Canadian Army veteran Russell Thompson of Seeley’s Bay, Ontario, who will turn 99 in a few months, embodies the values that made this country great. The sons of Russell Thompson, Earle and Steve, collaborated to prepare this blog post about their father, a role […]
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When I discovered this photograph online, I was struck with the lovely elegance of RCAF Women’s Division member and mapmaker Dorothy Garen. I was thrilled to find that Dorothy, now aged 95, is living not far from me in Canmore, Alberta, where I was able to thank her in person for her service to our […]
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After a bullet from a Japanese machine gun tore through her body, Australian nurse Vivian Bullwinkel floated face down in the sea and feigned death. She was the sole survivor of the 1942 Bangka Island Massacre, in which 22 nurses were forced to wade into the ocean at gunpoint and then shot in the back. It’s […]
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Plucky Iris Porter of the WAAF, the British Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, slept in a tent for two long years, swam in the Mediterranean Sea, rode camels, and visited the pyramids – all while serving her country in the burning Egyptian desert during World War Two.
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A case of mistaken identity thwarted Jim Milne’s plans to fly against the enemy, so he spent the war in Canada as a navigation instructor instead. When not on duty, he sketched some very amusing cartoons in his flying logbook! Now 97, Jim Milne lives with his wife Betty in the pretty mountain resort of […]
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