Elementary students took time out of their school day on Monday to pay their respects to fallen soldiers and veterans.
The Society of the Officers of the Honourable Guard invited students from Richard McBride Elementary School and the community to Fraser Cemetery Monday afternoon to help clean up the graves and headstones of veterans and soldiers buried there.
“It was wonderful,” said Rob Rathbun, member of the Society of the Officers of the Honourable Guard. “We actually cleaned a lot of graves there that day.”
The students helped clean about 75 graves, including war graves and the graves of veterans who passed away after the wars. A local group of Scouts returned later that evening to place candles on the graves that were cleaned earlier in the day.
This is the second year the society has organized the event, and interest is growing.
“It’s really coming along well now so it’s going to be expanded,” Rathbun said. “I predict next year we’ll have 100 kids out there cleaning graves.”
This year, about 30 students plus parents and community members came to the event. The society also led a class of grades 4 and 5 students on a tour of the cemetery last Thursday, introducing them to some of the veterans and their contributions to the war.
By hosting events like Monday’s, Rathbun hopes to get young kids interested in the veterans and fallen soldiers and their stories from the first and second world wars.
“We’re losing that generation very, very quickly right now, and it’s very important to pass on that torch, otherwise all those stories and sacrifices are going to be forgotten,” Rathbun said.
Rathbun is optimistic the annual Remembrance Day event will grow into a yearlong tradition where students and community groups clean the graves on an ongoing basis.
“We’d like to keep this going when the weather’s nicer as well,” he said.
For more information or to get involved with the Society of the Officers of the Honourable Guard’s initiative email [email protected].
