Juno Stories
Welcome to Stories from Juno, featuring interviews with 21 individuals who lived through World War II and who experienced, directly or indirectly, the D-Day landings and the Battle of Normandy. Here, you will hear from those who were there on Juno Beach, those who followed in the battle to liberate Normandy and Western Europe, and those who supported their efforts both overseas and in Canada.
Read more about the project
We have divided our veterans into three categories: D-Day, the Battle of Normandy, and Serve, Supply, and Support. In D-Day, you can learn firsthand about the experience of D-Day itself, from the beaches to the sea and sky. Taken together, these interviews highlight the joint efforts of the Canadian Army, Navy, Air Force, and Airborne divisions. In the Battle of Normandy, you will hear the stories of those who landed after D-Day to help with the advance into France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany by 1945. In Serve, Supply, and Support, learn more about those men and women whose contributions elsewhere in Europe and back in Canada were essential to the success of the Canadian, and Allied, war effort.
Alongside these interviews, you will find biographies and a trove of resources, from short histories of different aspects of the war, to maps, charts, infographics, war diaries, paintings, uniforms – all freely accessible, to enrich your understanding of this defining moment in history. For educators, we also provide lesson plans and additional resources to help your students research and craft their own digital commemorations of individuals from your communities and around the country.
In this section, you will find stories of triumph and sorrow; stories of friends made and friends lost; love and horror, adventure and boredom, war and – finally – peace. We hope with these commemorations to give you a sense of who these veterans were, and of how these individuals both experienced and affected the course of history.
After all, to better understand our history, who better to ask than the people who lived it?
Most recent project content
Story Maps
Storymap: Serve, Supply, Support
In Serve, Supply, and Support, learn more about those men and women whose contributions elsewhere in Europe and back in Canada were essential to the success of the Canadian, and Allied, war effort.
Education Resources
Bringing the commemoration plan to life
This lesson encourages students to consider how they can best leverage digital resources to create a highly effective commemoration.
Education Resources
Tell me a little bit more…with less
This lesson provides an (optional) opportunity to take students into greater depth as they learn to do more nuanced analysis of the evidence they have gathered.
Education Resources
Getting to know a Juno Beach Contributor
This lesson, with multiple entry points as described above, helps students to select the individual for whom they will develop a commemoration and to begin the process of gathering information about their life and contributions.
Education Resources
Commemorating Contributions and Sacrifices
This lesson introduces students to the concept of commemorations and begins their thinking about what makes an effective and meaningful commemoration.
