by Gordana Dimovska/Special to The News
May is a time where flowers follow showers, workers around the world organize to further the labour rights gained through struggle, and mothers are happily celebrated.
War victories are typically the furthest thing from the modern Canadian mind in this sunny month: most of us have grown up commemorating fallen soldiers on Nov. 11, stopping at 11 a.m. for a moment of silence.
For Europeans, however, May 8 is a day of incredible significance, known as Victory in Europe Day (or VE-Day for short).
This day marks the official end of the horrific turmoil of the Second World War in Europe, and Canadians had a lot to do with it – more specifically, some groups and businesses in Maple Ridge contributed a large amount to the war effort in a place so far away from them.
One way the people of Maple Ridge were encouraged to help was through a war drive, in which funds were to be raised through the sale of war bonds and saving certificates.
With a quota of $3,000 for Maple Ridge in January of 1941, 1,000 regular subscribers would be required to contribute in order to maintain funding month-to-month.
The Japanese Canadians of Maple Ridge, organized through the Maple Ridge Co-operative Produced Exchange, a donation of $4 from returns on fruit held at the time for sale to the U.K. Local Nokai leader Yasutaro Yamaga indicated to the Haney Gazette that the scheme would contribute between $250 and $300 to the drive.
Other donations came from staple companies of the Maple Ridge industrial scene.
Hammond Cedar Co., P. Bain Mills, and Port Haney Brick Co. each pledged monthly employee savings above $200 (with Hammond Cedar pledging $554). Even the post offices of Haney, Whonnock, and Hammond pledged funds towards the war drive.
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The Gazette took part in the organization of these war drives, holding a monthly meeting for leaders to review financial figures.
Families contributed, where they could, by way of the industrial and business groups they worked for – enabling the drive to reach further with fewer individual contact points needed.
The final bullets of the Second World War were fired on May 11, 1945.
Those who had given of their pockets to arm and feed their fellow Canadians fighting abroad could celebrate with the knowledge that they had aided the defeat of fascism even far from the battlefield.
Port Haney Brick Co., for its part, would receive a thank-you communication from Winston Churchill, whose portrait hung until very recently in the heritage Brickyard Office (now the community archives).
May the proud efforts of the people of Maple Ridge never be forgotten.
– Gordana Dimovska is the archivist with Maple Ridge Museum & Community Archives
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