John Sheardown Day declared in Windsor, Ont.

The City of Windsor will honour a Canadian immigration officer who has ties to a recent Hollywood hit.

Windsor Mayor Eddie Francis has declared that Nov. 10 will now be known as John Sheardown Day. 

Windsor's John Sheardown helped six Americans hide and then escape Iran during the 1979 Iranian Hostage Crisis.

John Sheardown is now 88 and living in Ottawa. His son Robin Sheardown lives in Windsor.

"It means a lot to my family. It means a lot to my father," Robin Sheardown said.

For months, the Americans were kept safe staying with the Sheardown's private residence.

"The main thing was to get them off the streets and in hiding," said Robin Sheardown, son of John Sheardown. "After they were actually in the house, he contacted Ambassador Ken Taylor and advised them that we've got house guests.

"My father did bribe the local guards, the garbage man. there's a lot of bribery going on. so they ignored the excessive garbage and they ignored the traffic in and out of the house."

The escape was recently dramatized in the move Argo, starring Ben Affleck.

However, Robin Sheardown said the movie leaves much of his father's story out, putting the spotlight on the CIA's Tony Mendez, who eventually got the Americans out of Iran.

"It's completely ignored all the Canadian involvement," Robin Sheardown said. 

He said the movie buries the Canadians in favour of Americans.

"The hero of the story was, I think, John Sheardown, my father," Robin Sheardown said. "And Zena Sheardown, and Pat Taylor, Kent Taylor, and the rest of the diplomats that were involved in it."

John Sheardown now lives in a veterans home in Ottawa. He has been diagnosed with Alzeheimers but his son says he remembers the past pretty well.