Since the publication of Bomb Girls: Trading Aprons for Ammo in 2015, several noteworthy projects have evolved to commemorate the lives of these courageous Canadian women who, with their tenacity and dedication, helped bring an end to the Second World War.
On June 6, 2024, in conjunction with the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion at Normandy, France, the Bomb Girls Legacy Foundation unveiled commemorative banners which flew along Eglinton Avenue in Scarborough, Ontario. Over forty individual banners depicting scenes and personnel who worked at the GECO war-time factory flew from Warden to Pharmacy Avenues from June until November 2024.
Over 400 people attended the banner unveiling celebration which took place at Centennial College in “The Hangar” at the Ashtonbee Campus in Scarborough, Ontario. Local Councillors and special guests spoke, the multi-talented Scarborough Theatre Guild performed, “Bomb Girls: A Documentary” was shown, and the Swing Junkies set the mood with their music. The Vintage Inn attended with several of their company dressed in vintage 1940s attire. Vintage cars, including a 1939 Buick, rounded out the excitement. However, the highlight of the event included presenting almost 70 commemorative scrolls to loved ones of Bomb Girls, formally recognizing these courageous women and men for their invaluable service on the home front.
The memorial Bomb Girls banners which hung along Eglinton Avenue in Scarborough, Ontario from June to November 2024 are now available for purchase. If you would like to own a unique keepsake of Canadian war-time history, now’s your chance. There are 30 banners available for sale – you can learn more here
Bomb Girls: Trading Aprons for Ammo has become a signature resource for all Canadians who wish to learn more about Canada’s Bomb Girls. Published in 2015 by Dundurn Press, it has seen several reprints and is still available for purchase through Amazon, Dundurn Press, Indigo or Chapters bookstores, or through Barbara Dickson, its author.
“Bomb Girls: A Documentary,” sponsored by Bell Media and directed by Mike Palmer, garnered international acclaim when it was short-listed in the prestigious 2018 Imperial War Museum’s International Short Film Festival in London, England.
As part of the Metrolinx Eglinton Crosstown LRT in Scarborough, Ontario, the stations situated on Eglinton Avenue where the GECO munitions factory was once located in the city’s east end, will showcase photos of the plant to remember the legacy of Canada’s Bomb Girls.
In 2017, two streets in a new residential neighbourhood in Scarborough, Ontario, were named in memory of the legacy of Canada’s Bomb Girls. The streets, “Cleanside Road” and “Fusilier Drive” can be found east of Warden Avenue and north of St. Clair Avenue East in South Scarborough, not far from where the original factory once stood. In addition, a new parkette, aptly called, GECO Park is situated in the same new neighbourhood; a little place of peace in the mega city of Toronto.
Bomb Girls: Trading Aprons for Ammo was a 2016 Finalist in the prestigious Speaker’s Book Award of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.
In September 2014 the City of Toronto commissioned urban muralist Mitchell Lanecki — Omen514 — to create a fitting tribute to the women of the GECO plant and their magnificent contribution to the Allied war effort. The mural is located on St. Clair Avenue East, east of Warden Avenue, on the north side of the Warden subway underpass.
