As Canadians across the country get ready to gather at cenotaphs and military monuments for Remembrance Day ceremonies, those who spent their life in service of their country are reflecting on their time in Canada’s military. Retired Lt.-Col. John O’Halloran lives at Perley Health’s Rideau Veterans Residence long-term care home. Speaking to CTV News Ottawa, he talks of starting his career in Canadian defence during the Cold War and helping to advance the use of technology in the military. On O’Halloran’s shelf at Perley sits a picture of his grandfather. His grandfather’s career of service and sacrifice through the Boer War and the First World War inspired him to enlist at just 17 years old. O’Halloran says while his grandfather served on horseback during the Boer War at the turn of the century, the now 87-year-old spent his military career helping Canada on the front line of defence implementing the latest technology starting in the 1950s. His job involved operating transmitters in the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals regiment, which is tasked with keeping the lines of communication open for the military. “It was exciting. It was an exciting time,” he said. O’Halloran says he worked in the Diefenbunker, a large underground concrete bunker in Carp that served as a fallout shelter for the Canadian government in the event of a nuclear attack from the Soviet Union. “During the Cold War, when the Diefenbunker was being built at the time, that would be my first posting to get there.” He also helped implement computers across Canadian Forces bases. “When I look at my career, I was at the cusp of big changes,” he said. “We went from tubes and (that) became a thing of the past, to microchips.” Over the course of his 39-year career, he was posted in Germany, the United Kingdom, Lebanon and Canada. He says he saw technology vastly change, but it’s importance to Canadian defence never wavered. “You had new radios, for example. Which enables you to communicate faster and better and more secure,” he said. “Which was the name of the game.” Today, he lives at the Perley Health among fellow veterans. As Remembrance Day approaches, it’s his grandfather he thinks of and the generations of service men and women who have sacrificed so much. “It’s time to reflect,” he said.
