The Fergus branch of the Royal Canadian Legion is celebrating its 80th anniversary this year.
On Sept. 19 Branch 275 will have a rededication ceremony outside the main entrance of the Legion hall at 2pm. Following the rededication there will be a cocktail hour at 6pm, dinner at 7pm and a dance to the music of local band Transit from 8:30pm to midnight.
Anniversary events are open to the public. Tickets cost $25 each and are available in advance at the Legion club room bar.
One Legion member planning to attend the celebrations is 89-year-old Helen Humphrey, who this year will celebrate her 55th anniversary as a Legion member.
The Second World War veteran joined the Canadian Women’s Army Corps in 1943 on her 18th birthday. She joined while she was living in Ottawa and on the way to watch a movie with a friend.
“The recruiting office was there and it was my 18th birthday so she said ‘do we?’ because she just had hers and I said, ‘yep’ and we went in and joined the army right on the spur of the moment,” Humphrey said.
After growing up just outside of Fergus and attending the Fergus High School, Humphrey took a war emergency course at Guelph Collegiate Vocational Institute and was sent to Ottawa to work for the Department of Mines and Resources.
After about six weeks on the job she joined the army.
“Well I was hoping that I was going to go over there, I’d be working in office work,” Humphrey said.
But because she was 18 she wasn’t permitted to go overseas; she had to wait until she turned 21.
After basic training in Kitchener, Humphrey was stationed in Kingston, where she worked in offices by the lake. However, she was occasionally sent to Ottawa to take notes for a social service officer.
“The officer had me come in and he said anything that you’ve got to (do), sneeze, cough or whatever he says ‘get it away now and then get behind that screen and don’t even breathe’,” she remembered with a laugh.
“Well, he said because these fellas were coming to be interviewed before they went overseas and they didn’t want to know about me or see me.
“So it was just so that I could take the notes and then he could compile them and then he could talk to them but I never ever said too much about that … I learned a lot of things at my young age of 18 about things that in those days in particular I never would have learned until much later.”
All her work in Canada was preparing her for the work she would be expected to do oversees when she turned 21. If she had gone overseas immediately she may never have met her husband, Harry.
He was a member of the British Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm, training in Canada and the pair met in Kingston.
Though Harry’s boat set sail for Japan, the war ended before he reached the fight and he returned to England. Humphrey was discharged in December 1945 and she planned to move to England to be with Harry.
“I chased him until he caught me,” she said with a chuckle. She landed in England on July 1, 1946 and the couple was married on Aug. 10.
However, it wasn’t all smooth sailing.
“The funny part was I got all permission from my father to travel to do all of this, but I didn’t ask for the permission to marry, so I had to send back and have the signed piece that I could get married,” Humphrey explained.
They stayed in England for seven years and during the beginning of their marriage they could still feel the effects of the Second World War.
“We had to live on stamps for different things, like so much cheese this week, so much butter this week and then so much margarine … and coupons to have clothes and stuff like that,” she said.
Upon their return to Canada, the couple moved first to Fergus, then to Guelph, where Humphrey now lives.
She joined the 257 John McCrae branch of the Royal Canadian Legion in Guelph in 1960. At the time it wasn’t easy for women to become members, so she started by joining the ladies auxiliary.
“But then when we got pushing, pushing and got in,” she said. “I got in in Guelph first and then we moved up to Fergus in 1980.”
Over her 55 years with the Legion, Humphrey was been a branch and zone secretary, a chaperone for the Legion’s track and field program and she helped out wherever the Legion needed her, whether it was in the kitchen, selling poppies, bartending or anything in between.
“I’ve always enjoyed being a part of the Legion. Always have. They care about people. They look out for people. They do an awful lot … they’ll be doing things for people that people don’t know they do. Sometimes it’s on the quiet,” she said.
It was Harry who was elected to help with the Ontario track and field team, so Humphrey said she joined him as a chaperone.
“It was fun working with the track and field,” she said. “I used to get a kick out of the kids. They were fun … but we figured they always gave us the boys because we had six boys of our own.”
Along with the athletes’ coaches, the couple would be with the athletes through their zone, district, provincial and Canadian competitions.
Now Humphrey plays a less active role in the Legion, but she still tries to make monthly meetings.
“Fifty years I’ve been a member of the Legion now and they’re having a dinner next month … so I’m planning on going to that if I can, I have every intention of making my way there if I can,” she said.
She drives herself to daytime meetings and often arranges to stay with her niece in Centre Wellington if it will be dark before she heads home.
Humphrey also tries to make the Remembrance Day service in Fergus every year.
Greg Manion, past president of the Fergus branch, said, “To have a person, 90 years old – and her mobility is not as good as it used to be – for her to be that committed, I mean that just shows what true commitment is all about.”
