When we think of World War I memorials we usually imagine stone or granite statues or traditional war memorials, not new media and technology. That has changed this week with the start of 1914 – 1918 Vigil, a temporary memorial project that is projecting the names of each of the 68,000 Canadian soldiers who died during WWI on Canada House in London (our embassy building there across from Trafalgar Square) as well as buildings across Canada, including the east tower of Toronto’s City Hall. You may have seen video of the/our Queen launch the projections in London earlier this week. If you have a relative who died in the Great War you can go to the site and find the exact time it will show up.
The Toronto Vigil The vigil will take place at Toronto City Hall in Nathan Phillips Square. As with every vigil, it runs for seven nights, starting at 5:00pm each evening, The first name appears at 5:15pm. Each night’s vigil will be 13 hours long, ending at sunrise the following day. The vigil will then recommence at 5:00pm and run another 13 hours. The last name will appear as dawn breaks on November 11th.
The Names The vigil will commence in Toronto November 4th 2008. More than 9,700 names will appear each night. Each individual name will appear only once during the seven nights. The names include those killed in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, the Canadian Merchant Navy and the Canadian Army Medical Corps. The names appear in the same sequence in each vigil location.
