Etched in stone
You can read about it, or you can watch films and documentaries. But to understand D-Day, you need to travel to Normandy and walk the shoreline yourself. You need to hear the waves crashing at Juno Beach and see the remains of the Nazi bunkers that were part of Hitler’s infamous Atlantic Wall.
Only by standing on the northern edge of France, overlooking the grey English Channel, can you begin to imagine what it was like on that stormy June morning seventy- five years ago when the fate of the war — and the world — hung in the balance.
Last summer, I was fortunate to visit the D-Day beaches. I stood on the heights at Omaha Beach, made famous by the movie Saving Private Ryan, and visited Gold Beach, where the British captured a harbour for Allied supply ships. But, for a Canadian, Juno Beach was the emotional epicentre of the trip.
Walking through the village of Bernières-sur-Mer, it was hard to believe that this was the scene of intense fighting on June 6, 1944, as thousands of Canadians took part in Operation Overlord — the Allied invasion of Normany.
Heading to the Maison des Cana
diens — one of the few homes not destroyed by Allied bombardment during the attack, it was later used by the Canadians as a command centre — I spotted a makeshift shrine.
It was a smattering of rocks, some painted or inked with messages of remembrance: “Merci”; “Je me souviens”; “We will remember them.” These small notes conveyed a vital message — that, despite the decades between us today and the D-Day soldiers, Canadians still care and remember.
In this issue, we commemorate the seventy-fifth anniversary of D-Day — detailing the heroism on the beaches, but also, in the skies and on the seas.
Other topics explored in the issue include the fight for same-sex rights, Canada’s rich baseball history, and the centennial of the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
As for D-Day, we should all give thanks to those who stormed the beaches on June 6, 1944. Imagine the world we would have today had the assault failed.