Right in the centre - May 8 is 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day
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- Published on Thursday, May 8, 2025
By Ken Waddell
Neepawa Banner & Press
May 8 is a very significant date for the whole world. It’s of special importance for Canadians and Manitobans. It was 80 years ago on May 8, 1945 that WWll came to an end in Europe. It’s known as VE-Day, or Victory in Europe Day.
We have devoted a bit of space in our three papers to exhibit how the respective front pages of our papers looked right after the May 8, 1945 date.
We are fortunate to have almost complete, albeit it very fragile, archive pages in our possession. In Virden we have actual copies back to the late 1890s, Rivers to the early 1900s and Neepawa back to 1896. These old pages make for fascinating reading. The retail prices are unbelievable by today’s standards. The cost of dresses, boots, shoes, overalls, smocks and tools are a far cry from today’s prices. Wages were much lower than today as well.
The VE-Day page in this paper is found on Page 8 of this week’s edition.
World War ll (WWII) was a war that united the world in a way never before seen in human history. Millions upon millions of people died in an effort to defeat Nazi Germany and Japan.
According to historians at the Canadian War Museum, 7,760 Manitobans died in the service of the war effort. 61, 543 men and women left their Manitoba homes to fight, or to serve as doctors or nurses, or other military supports, and almost 8,000 lost their lives, often in terrible conditions.
The Soviet Union lost the most people, as around 27 million Russians died during the war, including 8.7 million military and 19 million civilians.
According to Wikipedia, “The history of Canada during World War II begins with the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939. While the Canadian Armed Forces were eventually active in nearly every theatre of war, most combat was centred in Italy, Northwestern Europe, and the North Atlantic. In all, some 1.1 million Canadians served in the Canadian Army, Royal Canadian Navy, Royal Canadian Air Force, out of a population that as of the 1941 Census had 11,506,655 people, and in forces across the empire, with approximately 42,000 killed and another 55,000 wounded. During the war, Canada was subject to direct attack in the Battle of the St. Lawrence, and in the shelling of a lighthouse at Estevan Point on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.”
My uncle, James Aitken Waddell, served in the Royal Canadian Navy in the North Atlantic. He actually saw German U-boats in Halifax harbour. The U-boats also went up the St. Lawrence River. The Battle of the St. Lawrence was an extension of the larger Battle of the Atlantic— the German campaign during the Second World War to disrupt shipping from North America to the United Kingdom. Between 1942 and 1945, German submarines (U-boats) repeatedly penetrated the waters of the St. Lawrence River and Gulf, sinking 26 ships and killing hundreds. It was the first time since the War of 1812 that naval battles were waged in Canada’s inland waters.
I hope that readers will take a few moments to read the tiny faded print on the WWll pages of this week’s paper that give just a brief glance at what happened in Canada and to Canadians in WWll. Then, go to the internet and check out our history. It was a horrible time for the world and for Canadians. Please learn from the stories you find and please, please understand, it could happen again. In some parts of the world it’s already happening.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this column are the writer’s personal views and are not to be taken as being the view of the newspaper staff.
