This Remembrance Day, We Begin with Why we Remember

“I remember him leaning in and asking why I would want to forget.  ‘Memory,’ [Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel] said, ‘wasn’t just for ... survivors. The people who ask us to forget are not our friends. Memory not only honors those we lost but also gives us strength... Nothing good comes of forgetting; remember, so that my past doesn’t become your future’....”

The following post is a collaboration between Facing History and Ourselves and the Azrieli Foundation’s Holocaust Survivor Memoirs Program.

Remembrance Day is an opportunity for all Canadians to consider who we choose to remember and the lessons we can learn from people with first-hand experience of war. We invite our students to think deeply about the immeasurable costs of war, to weigh the sacrifices made for freedom and to honour the memory of Canadian soldiers. We bring testimony from soldiers and their loved ones into the classroom to deepen our students’ intellectual and emotional connections to those who fought and those who died. This Remembrance Day, bring a story about liberation — its necessity and its impact — to your students. Meet Claire Baum and learn her story.

Valerie Simmons was born in London, England in 1921. She has been writing poetry since she was six years old. At the beginning of WWII she worked in a first aid post dealing with Blitz casualties. When the Battle of Britain ended she joined the Women’s Air Force (WAF) where she was an admin officer throughout England and in Egypt. After the war she earned a BA from London University and went on to get her teaching qualifications. She has taught and worked in libraries.