Last sibling honours P.E.I. family's wartime service
Gail Harding | | Posted: November 2, 2017 9:00 AM | Last Updated: November 2, 2017
Bench will be dedicated at community service in Alberton Thursday
As the last surviving sibling from a family of nine children, Lucy Helen Peck wanted people to remember her family who lived on the Gray family farm in Alberton, P.E.I.
The 94-year-old helped make that happen one year ago by placing a memorial bench in a cemetery that bordered the farm.
Now she has donated another bench in memory of four of her brothers and a sister who served along with her in the Second World War.
The bench, located near the cenotaph in Alberton, P.E.I., will be dedicated Thursday. Peck, who lives in Ontario, will not be in attendance.
Peck said at her age she doesn't feel like travelling anymore but said, "I'm happy that it's there."
Leave a mark
"I just wanted to leave my mark on my hometown," she said. "All my brothers and sisters are gone and I'm the only one living so I asked the town of Alberton for permission and they were quite in agreement."
Garth Davey has been working with Peck to ensure the bench and plaque are in place near the cenotaph that sits next to the former train station from which Peck said they all left home.
"Towns very rarely receive such a wonderful donation," he said, adding it's made him think of doing more with the former train station, which now houses the local library.
Davey said a Vimy oak will also be planted at the dedication ceremony and he was preparing to plant 400 red tulips in front of the station so they will bloom next spring.
"I guess it's important … for many people who were in the First and Second World War, [it] would have been the very last thing that they saw before serving overseas of home. It's very representational."
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