A Fawcett local received the highest Canadian honour for volunteers in recognition of his time, compassion and commitment to community organizations.
A Fawcett local received the highest Canadian honour for volunteers in recognition of his time, compassion and commitment to community organizations.
Roger Smiley received the Governor General's Sovereign's Medal for Volunteers at a May 29 ceremony in the Alberta Legislature.
Smiley was one of 44 recipients at the ceremony last week.
'These hardworking citizens are focused on building strong, caring and vibrant communities that allow all members to thrive," said Lt.-Gov. Lois Mitchell.
'In this special birthday year for our country, it's a particular pleasure to recognize some of the people who embody the best of what it means to be Canadian."
Speaker of the Legislative Assembly Robert Wanner added: 'It is an honour to recognize the tireless service of these deserving community leaders. These volunteers enrich the lives of Albertans and make a positive impact in our communities."
The medal acknowledged the ex-serviceman's nearly 24 years of dedication to the Royal Canadian Legion. The medal highlighted his work designing and fundraising for a new cenotaph in Manning and promoting the Legion's Remembrance Day poster and essay contest at Manning schools. 'I was surprised to get a letter of acceptance for this but I do certainly appreciate being recognized for my efforts," Smiley said.
Smiley retired to Fawcett two years ago and prior to that lived in Manning for over two decades. In 2005 he launched an initiative to bring a new cenotaph to the community.
'The old cenotaph that they had in town was beside the highway and it was difficult to hold any kind of ceremonies due to traffic," he noted. 'Plus the salt from winter and the sanding of roads was destroying the old cenotaph so it wasn't worthwhile to refurbish it, so I decided to take it upon myself to design and fundraise a new one."
That project cost just under $15,000 and took over a year to complete. Smiley said he took elements from other cenotaphs he had seen to design the monument, which stands six-feet tall, five-feet wide and 1.5-feet deep at the Manning Legion hall.
'The community was really supportive of the project," he said.
The Sovereign's Medal also recognized his heavy involvement with the Legion's Remembrance Day poster and essay contest at five schools and a Hutterite colony in Manning.
To tie in with the poppy campaign and Remembrance Day ceremonies, every year the Legion invites students to write an essay, poem or draw artwork about Remembrance Day.
'They do all kinds of things: what war is like, cemeteries with crosses; it's quite interesting as to what these children actually do up," he said. 'Some of them are very, very fine art."
The local Legion branch judges the work and the winners move on to be judged at the area level, then the district level, provincial command and finally to Ottawa. The winners of that get to attend Remembrance Day in the nation's capital.
'It's very rewarding that a lot of the students and the teachers help promote that from the schools," he added. 'It's rewarding to keep freedom alive as our forefathers fought for."
Smiley followed in his father's footsteps, who had fought and survived the Second World War, when he served in the Royal Canadian Air Force from 1963-1988.
During his service, he spent five years on the aircrew for the Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft, six months in Cyprus with United Nations peacekeeping forces and five years in Belgium with Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe.
He also delivered food to Biafra during the Nigerian civil war and served a short stint in the Vietnam War.
The remaining time he was based throughout Canada and was part of Operation Morning Light, where he helped recover and clean up a Russian nuclear satellite that crashed in the Northwest Territories in 1978.
When he retired from the Air Force, he took a job at the Manning airport as a traffic technician 'moving materials and people by any mode of transportation anywhere in the world," he noted.
In 1994 he joined Legion Branch 137 in Manning.
'I'd seen a lot of things of things that needed to be moved forward and carried on so I took it upon myself to volunteer my time to do it," he said.
Two years ago he retired to Fawcett and joined the Westlock Legion Branch 97 where he currently acts as sergeant-at-arms and writes up the monthly newsletter.
Fellow comrade and Westlock Legion Branch 97 Chaplain Marjorie Steele nominated Smiley for the Sovereign's Medal several months ago.
'He was very involved with the Legion in different positions and volunteering in his community," she said. 'It just struck me that he deserved to be recognized for that. We didn't really know what the criteria was but I've known Roger for quite a few years. I used to work with his parents at the Fort Saskatchewan hospital - that was years ago."
Smiley was slated to receive the award in the winter but wasn't able to make it at the time, so he made his way to the May 29 ceremony. Several members from other Legion branches and air cadet squadrons were also recipients of the medal.
'It's pretty neat that there's only one in Branch 97 who received it so it's a feather in our cap," Steele added.
