Sidney's Paris Ford spent nine days this August walking in the footsteps of history, visiting cemeteries, memorials, and battlefields across France and Belgium as one of 14 Canadians, and two international teenagers selected for the Beaverbrook Vimy Prize.
Alongside fellow Greater Victoria participant, George Crowther, Ford immersed herself in Canada’s wartime legacy while connecting with students from the U.K. and France.
The program, run by the Vimy Foundation, gives youth a chance to explore historic First and Second World War sites while fostering international dialogue. This year’s focus was on the environmental impact of war.
Since it began in 2006, more than 300 young people have participated.
Ford, who lives along a small inlet off the Haro Strait, first heard about the program through a class at Stelly's Secondary School.
What stayed with her most was learning how to commemorate those who never made it home.
“From visiting countless cemeteries and seeing over forty thousand tombstones, to taking part in the Menin Gate commemoration ceremony in Ypres, to honouring the soldier that I researched, I daresay it changed me as a person,” said the soon to be grade-12 student.
The endless rows of graves turned statistics into something painfully real.
“Each cemetery and memorial we visited left a further impact. In textbooks and history classes you’re always hearing about the statistics,” Ford said. “The number of lost so great that you can’t even imagine it—until you see over a hundred thousand tombstones each day, each inscribed with a different name, a different story.”
Ford researched Pte. Maurice Connor, a soldier from Victoria, and shared a poem she wrote for him at the Canadian National Vimy Memorial.
“I felt as though he was there with me, listening on,” she said.
The journey wasn’t only about history, though. For Ford, the friendships made along the way became just as meaningful.
“Exploring the sites that we do is a vulnerable thing,” she said. “Knowing that you have an incredible support system of 16 people that you only just met is so powerful, and it makes you feel even more connected to the soldiers who would have felt the same about their comrades.”
Looking back, Ford says her greatest lesson was understanding the scale of sacrifice.
“Each soldier fought and gave their lives so that we, the future generations, would have the privilege of living in a time that it is safe to experience different nations, people, and programs like this,” she said.
