VALLEY MOURNS AS CRASH VICTIM BURIED
Shortly past noon Wednesday, two OPP cruisers bolted across Highway 17, lights flashing, forming a makeshift road block.
The reason became instantly clear: police were making way for the funeral procession for 18-year-old Brandon Thomas Hanniman, one of two Renfrew Timberwolves Tier 2 hockey players who died as the result of a single-vehicle crash on Calabogie Road on Oct. 27.
For 30 minutes-plus, police monitored the flow of cars turning left onto 17 from Forester’s Falls Road, next to the Muskrat River, which loops under Highway 17. The procession was heading from the Whitewater Wesleyan Church to the Rosebank Cemetery for final respects to a charismatic young man from the rural Valley whose smile it is said could light up a room.
“Brandon was a leader in the family and always took care of his younger cousins,” the Hanniman family noted in Brandon’s obituary. “He will be forever remembered by them and all of his friends.”
Hanniman was a 2017 graduate of Renfrew Collegiate Institute, which plans to honour his name in a scholarship award.
A few hundred metres up Highway 17 at the Shell station, friends were stopping in for a snack or a soft drink after the funeral. Wounds too fresh for comments on the record, two teenage boys, friends of Hanniman, said the family is still numb “but appreciates all the public support they have received since the accident.”
In the middle of the gas station two other boys hugged each other in comfort. Signs of a region mourning were everywhere.
Just off Highway 17 toward Renfrew, someone posted a sign in block letters outside the Tim Hortons drive-thru on Ogilvie Road expressing the sentiments of everyone in the town, and Valley, about four local teens:
“Remember Brandon & Alex. Pray for Jake and Ben.”
Alex Paquette, a passenger in the car driven by Hanniman, died in hospital. His funeral is Friday.
Ben Scheuneman remains in critical condition in hospital, Renfrew OPP said on Wednesday afternoon. Jake McGrimmon has been released from hospital.
Police say alcohol was a factor in the crash.
These deaths on Valley roads resonate especially with locals, even those no longer living there.
“Not many in the city understand that it’s a miracle that most teens get through life, and not many know what it’s like to have to say goodbye to their pals under the sombre gaze of the deceased’s parents,” says Christopher Penney, who grew up in Renfrew and recently completed an MBA at the University of Toronto.
“Some get tattoos to immortalize the lost, others set aside a weekend a year to get together. Some internalize it and are there for others when it happens again.
“However, the one common thing that carries on from one death to the next is the bond and knowledge of those that have been there before. It’s a concealed badge, and you’d think that it would get easier each time … but it never does and that’s what makes Renfrew, the Ottawa Valley and other small towns across Canada so beautiful.
“The reason it hurts so much is because we all care so much.”
Denny Ferguson, a Mississippi Mills councillor, concurs that Valley road tragedies, on or around Highway 17, are a horrible tradition.
“Everybody feels so bad about it, because everybody has either a relative or close friend who has been through the same thing over the years,” said Ferguson.
“It just hits so close to home for so many people.
Everyone played sports in the Valley, drank a bit, and drove a lot, Ferguson says.
“It’s just luck in many cases, you know?” Ferguson said.
Meanwhile, the circle of hockey rolls on. At the Ma-Te-Way Activity Centre, home of the Renfrew Timberwolves, a group of aspirants for the St. Joseph’s High School Hockey Academy are showing their stuff on the ice.
Watching through the end glass are Glen Ziebarth and his wife, Nancy. Their son, Grant, 12, hopes to be in this same program that Alex Paquette was in. The connections in the Valley don’t surprise anymore — Ziebarth knows the father of Brandon Hanniman because the dad, Tom, works for Barclay Dick & Son Farm Supply and delivers fertilizer to Ziebarth every spring.
Next fall, the youngest Ziebarth hopes to be on an early morning bus to St. Joe’s.
Driving on highways and twisting back roads is taken for granted in the Valley.
Grant Ziebarth’s minor bantam coach is from Deep River and drives all over the Valley and beyond for practices, games and tournaments.
You’re not safe until you are home. An agonizing 15 minutes south of Renfrew, from their homes, is where the boys’ car veered off the road.
Across Calabogie Road, a couple of kilometres west of Burnstown, the crash site has become a memorial.
Crossed hockey sticks and colourful bouquets of flowers adorn the hillside rock outcrop into which the car crashed. Two white crosses bear the names of Alex and Brandon. A third cross, of plain wood, has no name.