On Monday, the old men of my hometown will stand before the names of their dead friends, the November-whipped wind that much colder than the year before, and try not to think of Norman Bethune.
Gravenhurst is a small town in the cottage-country District of Muskoka. Its principle claim to international fame (now that the original Sloan's blueberry pie is but a memory) is that Norman Bethune was born there.
A Canadian doctor who contributed to developments in mobile blood banks and thoracic surgery, Norman Bethune was also a committed Communist who died in 1939 while serving the army of Mao Tsetung. Mao revered his Canadian friend, and a billion Chinese studied his life. Many of them may never have heard of Toronto, but all Chinese know about Gravenhurst.
The citizens of Gravenhurst also revere the memory of Bethune, now that the word Communist has no meaning. So greatly is he honoured that they removed the veterans memorial to make way for his statue. Yes, that is what they did.
But let's go back. In 1971, as Ottawa inched toward recognition of Communist China, delegations from Beijing arriving in Canada refused to go anywhere until they had first visited the shrine of the Bethune birthplace. Except the "shrine" was actually the United Church manse, home to the family of Rev. John Houston.
Month after month, troops of Chinese dignitaries traipsed through the Houston home, gazing reverentially at the very room where the great man was born -- although, in reality, it was the bedroom of eight-year-old John, distinguished by a large poster of a frog with the text: "Kiss me."
The Houstons asked the federal government to purchase the house, so the church could build a new one. But Bethune was a controversial figure. A bid to rename the local high school in his memory was scotched when some of the older teachers threatened that they would quit before setting foot in a school named after a Red.
The federal government was nervous about honouring a Communist, and refused to buy the house. The Houstons regretfully closed their home to visitors. The new Chinese ambassador discovered that his countrymen could no longer visit the shrine, and expressed his thoughts. The federal government quickly bought the house.
Thirty years and a Cold War victory later, the Bethune House museum remains a popular tourist attraction, which is why, two years ago, the town council planted a statue of the Great Helmsman's Great Friend in a prominent square on the main street. There is no such thing as too much tourism.
The statue was part of a general renovation of the square. That renovation included removing the memorial honouring the citizens of Gravenhurst who had given their lives in the two world wars. The local Legion was initially quiescent, with everyone agreeing that the plaque containing the names could be moved to a side street.
My father served in the RCAF during the Second World War, losing a lung and a brother. It's not a time he's ever wanted to talk about.
But he joined the Legion and, most years, walked up to the main street on Nov. 11, to stand with his friends and remember whatever it is they remember on that day, men whose experiences so eclipsed those of my generation that those memories, finally, are unknowable to us.
When he heard about the plans to remove the war memorial and replace it with a statue of Bethune, Dad wrote a letter to the local newspaper, wondering why it was not possible to honour Bethune without dishonouring the war dead.
Word got around. Veterans and their supporters rallied in defence of the memorial -- never once, mind you, attacking the idea of the statue itself -- and the town council eventually reversed its decision. A new memorial was finally put up in the square. It has that sad, defeated look of a new church replacing an old one that burned down.
We are forgetting, you know. There's nothing evil about it; it's just human nature to forget. The generation being born will learn about the Second World War, but they will not walk among those who fought in it. They will not know those men who were thrown into an inferno, so young, the future of civilization itself at stake, not one of them emerging unscathed.
We would move a war memorial, to make way for something more important.
Something more important. jibbitson@globeandmail.ca
John Ibbitson