Sep 28 2016
September 2016 On 24 September 2016, 60 volunteers from a wide age-range gathered in Centralia, Pennsylvania, a borough in the heart of Pennsylvania’s anthracite coal region, for a community clean-up. Although the borough is virtually abandoned, with only 6 residents remaining, two busy state roads run through it, so Centralia is far from deserted. Some of …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/the-great-american-clean-up-volunteers-clean-up-illegal-dumping-in-centralia/
Aug 29 2016
August 2016 On the shore of Lake Ontario in Kingston, Ontario, sits an 8.6 hectare plot of land, encircled by large, foreboding limestone walls containing several limestone buildings within them. This complex was once known as Kingston Penitentiary, British North America’s first penitentiary. The prison sits beside Portsmouth Harbour, a site chosen for its convenient access to the …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/do-not-pass-go-canadas-first-penitentiary-closed-after-178-years-service-but-its-legend-lives-on/
Aug 23 2016
August 2016 On 19 August 2016, a ceremony was held to commemorate the re-opening of the historic Oro African Methodist Episcopal Church at the intersection of Line 3 North and Old Barrie Rod in Oro-Medonte Township. Several dignitaries attended he public ceremony including Ontario Lieutenant-Governor The Honourable Elizabeth Dowdeswell, MPs Alex Nuttall and Bruce Stanton, …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/restored-historic-oro-african-methodist-episcopal-church-re-opens-to-great-fanfare/
Aug 12 2016
Note: this is an update of an article written in 2007. August 2016 Simcoe County is fortunate to have numerous museums, telling the story of the county’s military, railroading, frontier and aboriginal past. One small and little known museum that exists right in the heart of Barrie’s downtown is The Grey & Simcoe Foresters Regimental Museum. …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/military-museum-holds-regiments-history-2/
Jul 25 2016
On 23 July 2016, Bala’s Museum held their annual “Everything About Anne Day,” where they re-create the day in 1922 when Anne of Green Gables author Lucy Maud Montgomery came to Bala, Ontario, for a 2 week vacation. Starting off with the arrival of “Lucy Maud Montgomery” (played by Donna Hillyard) herself by carriage, the …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/everything-anne/
Jul 14 2016
July 2016 Toronto was once a beehive of aviation activity, with numerous small public and private airfields in the area, most of which have vanished from the landscape with little to remind people today of the property’s aviation past. Barker Field is one of those vanished airfields. Originally named Century Airport, the privately owned aerodrome …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/vanished-airfields-barker-field/
Jun 19 2016
June 2016 As a part of the 100th anniversary of CFB Borden, the base unveiled the Borden Legacy Monument, built as a lasting monument to the sacrifices of Canadian soldiers who trained at Camp Borden and died in the European battlefields. The monument features two black granite walls, one that contains an urn filled with …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/borden-legacy-monument/
May 27 2016
May 2016 On 22 May 2016, I visited Kent State University, the site of the Kent State shootings where, on 4 May 1970, members of the Ohio National Guard fired upon unarmed students protesting President Nixon and the bombing campaign of Cambodia. The campus has the May 4 Museum, a monument to the students who died …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/tin-soldiers-and-nixon/
Aug 27 2015
May 2015 A ghost town is a once-populated area that is abandoned, or partially abandoned, because the economic activity that supported it has failed, or due to natural disasters, government actions, environmental or nuclear disasters or war. Centralia, Pennsylvania, is one such partially abandoned ghost town. Deep in Pennsylvania’s anthracite coal region, the town once …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/the-town-that-was/
Jan 13 2011
Published in the Claresholm Local Press 2 December 2009 Longtime residents of the Claresholm area will probably remember a time when the air buzzed with the sound of RCAF aircraft from an aerodrome west of Claresholm. Early in the Second World War, the Royal Canadian Air Force entered into an ambitious project: the British Commonwealth …
Permanent link to this article: https://militarybruce.com/claresholm-industrial-airport-has-rich-military-past/
