4 minute read
“See if there is a letter from your Dad”
Dale Yeo
It was a Saturday morning early in May of 1945, the slow-ebbing final days of World War II.
Fourteen year-old Margie Scott of Sheho,
Saskatchewan ,was in the family home when she heard her mother Sophie’s voice call out.
“Margie, the train will have just come in with the mail. I’d like you to go to the Post Office to see if there’s a letter from your Dad. We haven’t heard from him in a while now.”
“Dad” was Corporal Cecil Scott of the R.C.E.M.E. (Royal Canadian Electrical Mechanical Engineers). He had landed at Normandy in the D-Day assault of June 6, 1944, and then fought alongside his comrades through France and into Holland. The post office was about three blocks away.
Margie got ready to go. Should she take her five year old brother with her? No, she decided. He could be such a little brat. Leaving the house, Margie found her thoughts straying to her father, so far away from the family. These were perilous times, she knew, and death in the war was no stranger to the people of her little Sheho community. Two years earlier the Ukranian Orthodox priest in Sheho had come up with the idea of showing light-hearted movies in the Ukranian Hall. For 15 cents per child, 25 cents per adult, the stress of wartime could be relieved by a western movie or an Abbot and Costello comedy.
But even then, the war could intervene. Margie recalled the evening back in 1943 when the projectionist had halted that night’s showing part way through. Mr. Currie, the station-master, who received any telegram sent to Sheho, had walked through the hall and then onto the stage.
He delivered the tragic news. The son of the United Church minister and the son of the grocery store owner, both airmen and both friends, .had been killed in action over Europe.
The names of Airman Hector Monro and Airman Norman Leckie can be seen today on the great black granite memorial to RCAF personnel at the airfield outside Brandon.
Margie had never forgotten that sad evening and its sad news.
As she walked down the street, Margie spotted a man in uniform in the distance. That was hardly an uncommon sight in the little town. Nearly one in eleven Canadians was in uniform by the war’s end. Seeing someone so dressed was an everyday reminder that the war loomed over all.
She walked on, her thoughts those of any young teenager on a warm spring day.
Her attention was drawn again to the man in uniform who had by then drawn considerably closer to her.
The way he walked . . . .he was now striding more quickly towards her. His gait, no, it can’t. ”Yes.”
“That’s my Dad! That’s my Dad!” She bounded toward him and then threw herself into his arms. He wrapped her up in an enormous bear hug.
Minutes later, they turned to go home. Together. It was a moment that Margie would never see diminish in her memory.
Just before arriving at their house, Margie let go of her Dad and skipped ahead. She went to the back door of the house and entered the kitchen.
Her mother, hearing her enter, called out “Is there a letter from your dad?”
“No, said Margie, something much better than that.”
This is a true story. Margie is Marge Cherney, of Roblin, Manitoba. Now 89 years young. Marge is a long-ago teaching colleague and a much longer friend of the story writer. In 1962, when they first met, she was Mrs. Marge Perchaluk, a teacher in Roblin’s elementary school system, and the writer, Dale Yeo, a rookie teacher at Roblin Collegiate Institute.
She is a wonderful lady who, very deservedly, remains very proud of her father’s wartime service. Her precise recall of details in this story of 75 years ago is amazing.
This story was sent in to be a part of our Book of Memories. RTAM is still receiving short stories. See our website for some guidelines, and a couple examples others have submitted. Everyone agrees that this book is a very worthwhile effort, yet few of our 10,000 members have submitted. Come on, folk, you had some interesting times in and around the classroom, help us compile these for ourselves and others to read. Marge, at 89, is mailing us, longhand, her story.
It was our intention to bring this request forward at our AGM in May, but. . . .
This story also is meant to stir some thoughts about Remembrance Day. If we wait till the next issue of KIT, November 11 will be well past, so we are sending out a heads up now.
This spring, the RTAM Board passed a motion to donate to any chapter $40 to purchase a wreath and lay it. This will cover the cost for a medium sized wreath. Contact office@ rtam.mb.ca The information we have now is that orders must be placed in Ottawa before September 18, phone 204 233-3405, or place your order with your local Legion.
Choose a youth, if you can, someone whose family has a military or country-serving background. Lay the wreath on behalf of all Retired Teachers at your local Remembrance Day ceremony. Yes, there will be COVID-19 cancellations, we know that, but we also know that last year, when the first wreath was laid for RTAM, not just for a chapter, it was well received.
And please, members, if you have, or know of such a remembrance story for next year, please contact us. And send in your classroom stories.
Thank you to Dale Yeo and Marge Cherney, both retired teachers. – RTAM Public Relations Committee
