Members of Gyro International gathered at a memorial and placed flowers in remembrance of those who served in the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War.
On Tuesday (June 4) members of Gyro, a men’s social organization, placed flowers at the memorial outside the BC Aviation Museum in North Saanich, along with the landscape architect who designed the memorial, Illarion Gallant.
The memorial first was specifically designed to be dedicated to Robert Hampton Gray, the last Canadian to die in the war when his plane was shot down after leading a successful attack against a Japanese ship.
The memorial features a wall with information about Gray’s journey, and has a number of maple leaves dedicated to others who fought in the same war.
“So I said, ‘if I do this, I want to do this wall for the other people who died,’ and [the museum] said yes, so that represented the other men from [Greater] Victoria who died in battle, that’s what the flowers are about,” said Gallant.
It’s the second memorial he has designed dedicated to the air force. The first, built in 2017, is a row of Cooper Hawk feathers with the names of air force members listed on the sides at a popular spot for plane spotters near the Victoria airport.
“The Cooper Hawk, its range is from California and it goes as far as say the mid-island in the Winter and they are quite ferocious actually. [Scientists] found their chest bones have been always been broken because they just nail trees, so their these ferocious hunters who are always getting injured,” he said. “That’s why I chose the Coopers Hawk as a symbol of these people who were learning to be fighters.”
Since the first memorial was built, he has received numerous emails from the families of people who’s names are listed on the feathers asking for him to place flowers at the memorial on their behalf.
Gallant visits his memorials every Remembrance Day, but invites people to visit and pay their respect any day of the year and place flowers for those who served.
Read More: Aviation museum in North Saanich unveils monument to B.C. pilot killed in Second World War
