For the past two years, one Grade 12 Centre Dufferin District High School (CDDHS) student has seen history through a local World War II veteran’s eyes. Recently, he had the opportunity to see it through his own.
Thomas Hallett, 17, has been learning about the wartime experiences of George Bist, a 97-year-old family friend who lives in Dufferin Oaks in Shelburne. By talking to Bist about his early life, Hallett learned how he enlisted in the army and trained for war, as well as military history, straight from someone who was there. Bist’s daughter, Candice Bist, also gave Hallett other records including maps and information about her father’s involvement creating the Canadian flag.
“It forces us teenagers to actually acknowledge that the past isn’t just a story,” said Hallett. “It happened and it happened to these people.”
The research was part of a two-year program at CDDHS, which culminated in a tour of battlefields and war memorials in Belgium, Germany, Austria and France. During the trip, each student presented their research on anOntario veteran at the Juno Beach Centre in Normandy.
The program is run by Neil Orford, who has taught history at CDDHS since 1997. CDDHS has a formal partnership with the Dufferin County Museum and Archives in Mulmur. In November, Orford won a Governor General’s History Award for Excellence in Teaching Canadian History.
“Canadians have always had the difficulty of defining an identity for themselves,” says Orford. “In the difficulties and sacrifices that came before us, we find a common purpose. As a history teacher, I have a duty to make these connections for kids. The reward of it is that you get to be part of seeing how it will change the kids’ lives.”
Orford got the idea for the “Batallion Tour” in 2006 when he met a D-Day veteran named Ken Wallace. After hearing Wallace’s story, Orford began collecting the names and stories of veterans in Dufferin County on his own. When he had about 700 stories, he donated his work to the Dufferin County Museum, where he was a board member.
“Dufferin doesn’t have a World War II memorial, or one for the Korean War, for that matter,” Orford says. By archiving students’ research, he says the museum is able to make it available for the next generation.
In an effort to honour the veterans, Orford decided to reach out to the Juno Beach Centre, which is based in Burlington. Then, he made the research part of the high school curriculum.
Now, Grade 10 students choose a veteran and learn about their story by meeting people (such as the veteran’s family members) and conducting research.
“I realized I could teach the students through the museum how to be local archivists, and how to make that part of a very broad great Canadian narrative. It’s something you could never do in a classroom.”
This year, 35 Grade 12 students accompanied Orford to Europe where they visited Dieppe, Ypres, Juno Beach, Vimy Ridge, Dachau and Nuremberg.
“The tour was more than a trip to Europe, however – more than a chance to shop and see some landmarks,” explained Hallett. “We knew that we were in Europe to remember the veterans of the two World Wars more than to gawk at scenery and landmarks.”
In Dieppe, Hallett layed a wreath at the Remembrance Day service there. “As we laid the wreath down, the weight of the memorial’s names became heavier than that of the eyes on me. Nothing came easier to me in that moment than bowing my head in simple and personal respect,” he said.
The cost of the trip for each student was $5,000 plus meals. Hallett spent the last two years raising the money by working different jobs at Curiosity House Books, the Mansfield Ski Club and the Terra Nova pub.
For Hallett, the effects of the trip will last a lifetime. “All the places you hear and read about in history are actual places. Seeing them as real places and not as imagined concepts is striking.”
After returning from the trip, Hallett wrote down some of his recollections. Here is his impression of visiting Germany’s Dachau concentration camp:
“We all had a feeling of trepidation about entering this former concentration camp. But I couldn’t have anticipated the effect it would have. Walking in through those black iron gates, I felt as if I’d been punched. The silence was instant and painful. It swallowed sounds such as footsteps and breathing, but amplified voices until they seemed painfully loud. The camp had a chill that soon had me shivering, and after 10 minutes there I felt as if someone had been screaming. Some of the monuments built for the victims were powerful enough that I had to resist turning on my heel and running away from them.
“I am glad that our tour visited the camp, however that does not mean that I was reluctant in anyway to leave it behind.”