VICTIMS CAME FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE

They were police officers and teachers, small-business owners and nurses, denturists and prison guards. They were mothers and fathers, couples with long marriages and newlyweds — and teenagers too. Together, they are the victims of the worst mass shooting in Canadian history.

There may still be more victims, police said, as they continue to search through 16 crime scenes, including burned-down homes, along a 100-kilometre route in Nova Scotia.

“To everyone hurting and trying to make sense of what has happened, please know that we too are doing so,” said RCMP Chief Supt. Chris Leather.

Tributes poured in from police forces across the country for Const. Heidi Stevenson, a 23-year veteran of the force and mother of two. Her colleagues described her as a well-known presence in the community and a voice of the force. Her husband is a schoolteacher.

Halifax Regional Police Staff Sgt. Scott MacDonald knew Stevenson as a “neighbour, colleague and friend,” he said. National Police Federation president Brian Sauve said she should be remembered as nothing short of a hero.

“It’s a heroic decision to dedicate your life to the safety of Canadians and then it’s only more so if you end up giving an ultimate sacrifice,” he said.

Lisa McCully, a teacher at Debert Elementary School, was also a beloved member of her community, according to principal Scott Armstrong. She was the first to volunteer, he said, and that was evident in her years of work as a youth leader for a United Church of Canada Bible camp in Berwick, N.S.

“She loved teaching and was completely committed to her own two children and every student in her class and in our school,” Armstrong said. “She was an incredibly positive person whose love of life and children brightened the day of anyone who came in contact with her.”

The youngest known victim, 17-year-old Emily Tuck, used music to liven spirits dealing with the COVID-19 quarantine blues.

Her father, Aaron (Friar) Tuck, recently posted a video of her masterfully blazing through the East Coast waltz in memory of Herbie MacLeod. After hitting her note, Emily leaned in with a laugh: “There’s some fiddle for you.”

Aaron Tuck and Emily’s mother, Jolene Oliver, were found dead in their home in Portapique, Jolene Oliver’s sister, Tammy Oliver-McCurdie, said.

Heather O’Brien and Kristen Beaton both worked for the non-profit Victorian Order of Nurses. O’Brien was a licensed practical nurse for nearly 17 years. She was a wife, a mother and a granddaughter.

Her daughter, Darcy Dobson, received a final text message from O’Brien at 9:59 a.m. on Sunday.

“By 10:15 she was gone,” Dobson wrote online.

Beaton was a continuing care assistant in Truro, N.S. She leaves behind a husband who she married 10 months ago, and a son, still a toddler.

Gina Goulet, 54, had nearly beaten cancer for a second time when she was killed, her daughter Amelia Butler said. “She fought so hard for her life,” Butler said.

Goulet described her work as a denturist in Shubenacadie as her “arts and crafts.” She had been in the field, the same as the gunman’s, for 27 years.

Her friend, Michelle Anthony, described her as a “spit fire.” Goulet was well-known as an avid salsa dancer and loved vacations in Cuba.

“That was the place where she was the happiest,” her daughter Amelia Butler said.

Greg and Jamie Blair operated a small company that provided propane and natural gas installations.

Jamie Blair’s aunt, Judy MacBurnie, said the pair had two small children who are being cared for by grandparents. Greg Blair also had two older sons from an earlier relationship.

MacBurnie said her nephew Jamie was a “wonderful person who was always laughing and was the funniest person you ever met.” “He could find humour in anything and anybody … You couldn’t be around him too long because your face and belly hurt so bad from laughing.”

Two other couples — Alana Jenkins and Sean McLeod, and Dawn Madsen and Frank Gulenchyn — were also killed.

Jenkins and McLeod lived in Wentworth, N.S., and were both prison guards. The former worked at the Nova Institution for Women in Truro, N.S., and the latter at Springhill Institution.

Madsen and Gulenchyn lived in Portapique and had two sons who lived in Ontario.

One of their sons, Jon Farrington wrote online that he desperately tried contacting the couple on Sunday, to no avail. Later, he would learn that their house had been burned down.

Lillian Hyslop was killed while out for a walk in Wentworth, N.S., according to the Chronicle Herald. Hyslop was known as a regular on the walking trails.

Her husband reportedly answered a call from concerned neighbours who were trying to warn her not to go out for her morning walk. By the time the call came, she had already left.

Corrie Ellison was also in the “wrong place at the wrong time,” according to his childhood friend, Jeffrey Langille. Ellison was in Portapique to visit his father when he was killed.

Retired firefighter Tom Bagley was out for a walk Sunday morning when he saw a house on fire and a police vehicle in the yard, his friend Jocelyn Crowley Morris wrote on Facebook.

“He died trying to help, which if you knew him, you knew that was just who he was all the time,” his daughter Charlene Bagley said.

SHE LOVED TEACHING AND WAS COMPLETELY COMMITTED TO HER OWN TWO CHILDREN.