Kyle Scott: The medals man

Story by Stephen J. Thorne

Don Fraser was one of the many Saskatchewan boys who served in the wartime navy, spending more than two years sailing the treacherous North Atlantic and Arctic waters between 1943 and 1945.

He is believed to have been among the crew aboard the cruiser HMS Belfast during the spring 1944 attack on the German battleship Tirpitz. He was a rare example of a sailor who set foot on the D-Day beaches, helping to retrieve wounded soldiers. He was in the convoys that sailed to Murmansk delivering war materiel from Halifax and New York to Soviet Russia.

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All for one: how unification shook up the military

Story by Sharon Adams

In the 1960s, federal politicians were concerned that spending by some departments was out of control. Cost-cutting began, and the gaze of the bean counters fell on the sector accounting for about a quarter of the federal budget: national defence.

The army, navy and air force each had their own administrative and support structures, and the politicians believed they could cut costs and inefficiency of triplification by integrating the services. And in the run-up to Canada’s centennial year, with growing desire for a distinct national identity, some believed going the extra step—unifying the services—would serve another goal: Canadianization.

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February 2, 1942

The Canadian Women’s Auxiliary Air Force is renamed the RCAF Women’s Division.

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Victory by chocolate

Story by Stephen J. Thorne

Ah, chocolate. Milk, dark, sweet, semi-sweet—no matter. For soldiers in the field, it has for centuries been respite, fuel source, even currency that bought service, purchased lives, symbolized peace and goodwill, and enlisted hearts and minds.

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Travels of a wounded soldier

Story by Sharon Adams

At noon on Jan. 17, 1917, a group of comrades were eating a lunch of bully beef and hardtack near Vimy, France, when their dugout was damaged by German shelling.

Their work was cut out for them. They needed a new dugout “so we will have a place for the night,” Private Harry Morris wrote home in a letter to his family, published online by the Canadian Letters and Images Project (http://www.canadianletters.ca).

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January 28, 1986

Space Shuttle Challenger explodes after liftoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
All seven astronauts on board are killed, including teacher Christa McAuliffe.

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