IF Day was a fake Nazi invasion of Winnipeg that took place in 1942, designed to frighten Canadians into buying more war bonds. At some point during the six long years of the Second World War, probably every Canadian secretly feared an invasion by the enemy. On February 19, 1942, they didn’t have to speculate […]
Bomb girls in Canada were represented by Ronnie, the Bren Gun Girl. She was just one of one million Canadian women who worked in factories during the Second World War. Bomb Girls Around the World When World War Two began, British women trooped into factories in full force. They were desperately needed there, as Britain […]
Almost 11,000 Canadian conscientious objectors refused, mainly for religious reasons, to perform military duties during World War Two. So the government required them to do “alternate service” in work camps, many of them in Western Canada’s national parks. Ray Crook was not a conscientious objector. He was rejected from military service because of a heart murmur. […]
How were children on the home front protected from the horrors of a world at war? The short answer: they weren’t. Kids were fully involved in the war effort, doing whatever their little hearts and hands could manage. Many children who grew up during the war were too young to fight, but they still wanted to do […]
Seventy-two years after my uncle RCAF pilot trainee Alan Light died in a training accident, I discovered a dramatic oil painting that shows the last moments of his life.
Wartime knitting was more than a hobby – it was an act of patriotism. Literally millions of women, children and even men in Allied countries used their knitting needles as weapons of war. If you weren’t a knitter, you might as well have been a Nazi! Countless knitted items were created and sent to the […]
Rationing was a fact of life in the Second World War. For five long years people ate less meat, sugar and other products. But there were few complaints. Not only were we feeding the desperate British population, we were shipping enormous quantities of food to our own armed forces, and our prisoners of war. Why […]
Princess Elizabeth, who late became Queen Elizabeth, eldest daughter of the British royal family, was born on April 21, 1926. Just six months after her thirteenth birthday, the world went to war. This determined teenager threw herself into the war effort and over her father’s objections, she even joined the armed forces and trained as […]
My mother played wartime music on the piano when I was a kid, just as we were falling asleep. So my fascination with that era first began with its wonderful, evocative music: lilting love songs, morale-boosting melodies, big band swing and sweet songs of separation that wring your heartstrings. Click on the title to hear […]
Fearing an enemy invasion, thousands of Canadian girls as young as sixteen joined volunteer militia groups in wartime, learning how to conduct air raid patrols, use firearms and incredibly, how to handle bombs!
