Leisureworld Barrie resident receives 65-year service bar from legion 90-year-old operated heavy equipment during Second World War   Friday June 4, 2010 -- Lisa Bailey Gilbert Baldwick has been recognized for 65 years of service to the Royal Canadian Legion. Jim Strang and Jean-Claude Charron, the president and sergeant-at-arms respectively of Legion Branch 147 in Barrie, paid a visit to Leisureworld Caregiving Centre Barrie May 21 to present Baldwick with his service bar and ribbon. “It’s pretty good,” Baldwick says of the recognition. “It’s a lot of years,” adds the 90-year-old, who has lived at the long-term care home of 57 residents in Barrie for nearly a year. Program manager Sheila McConnell says Baldwick was “delighted” by the visit from the Legion representatives, who said they would return to visit him. The proud son of a Boer War and First World War veteran, Baldwick served in France, Belgium, Holland and Germany during the Second World War. He had originally enrolled with the Canadian Armoured Corps but transferred to the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers, whose primary responsibility was enabling the army to move. Baldwick was an equipment operator and recalls how bulldozers were loaded onto barges for use following the Allied D-Day invasion. He says he was working on a bridge in Holland when word arrived that a crew was being assembled to go to Japan. Volunteering to go, Baldwick quickly returned to Canada and was on leave in Barrie when the United States dropped the atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, Nagasaki was bombed. These acts, which killed tens of thousands, ended the war and Baldwick never went to Japan. He received a number of medals for his service. In 1945, he joined the Legion branch in Midhurst, near Barrie. He served as the organization’s president for one year and recalls that they had a “pretty good poppy fund.” Baldwick says the branch helped people in the neighbourhood, including a young girl who had been burned. The branch closed and Baldwick is now with the Barrie branch. Asked what he enjoys most about the Legion, he replies with a laugh, “I guess the beer.” McConnell notes there are a few veterans residing at Leisureworld Barrie. A few times a year, she says, they and some other residents enjoy lunch at the Legion. Veterans also receive periodicals at the home. “We really try to keep the veterans aware of what’s going on, and we always have our memorial service. We realize there’s not that many left so we certainly try to focus on them and what they’ve given,” McConnell says. If you have feedback on this story, please call the newsroom at 800-294-0051, ext. 25, or e-mail lisa(at)axiomnews.ca.