As Remembrance Day approaches, memories of her dad’s 26-year military career and his subsequent 10 years with the Calgary Police Service are never far from Meadowbrook School teacher Heather Ponath's mind. “He was present at our Remembrance Day Assembly last year at Meadowbrook School, just months before his passing,” she said. “His grandfather was in the war and service was always important to him.” Major Norm Altenhof passed away in January 2018, at the age of 75. During his military career, he was posted around the world, including as a member of the International Commission of Control and Supervision in Vietnam in the 1970s, where he assisted with the release of American prisoners of war (POWs) in 1973 – including John McCain, who later became a United States Senator. “Knowing my dad, he probably signed himself up [for this duty],” Ponath said. “My dad was always taking those kinds of adventures. He either would have been assigned or would have jumped on board.” Ponath said her father enjoyed living all over the world – she was born at the Canadian Forces Base at Baden, in what was then West Germany, during one of his postings. The family also lived all over Canada. “My dad’s absence was apparent at times; however, even while away, my dad always wrote letters or sent cassette tapes back to his family,” she said. “He shared the events of his days and he always reminded us how much his family meant to him and how much he missed us.” Despite being proud of his career with the military, Ponath said, her father didn’t speak about his experiences very often. It was only in the last year or so – once the Military Museum in Calgary began interviewing him as part of a planned exhibition on Canadians in Vietnam – that she learned what he went through. “That was the most that he’d ever talked about it. He didn’t ever like talking about it,” she said. “You knew, in the family, that you didn’t really ask. I don’t know if it upset him. “Some of his stories are now actually in the exhibit, which just opened, including a video of my dad talking about the release of the POWs. There is a section on him and he donated quite a few artifacts.” Having grown up in a military family, Ponath said, Remembrance Day has always been important to her. She has taught with Rocky View Schools (RVS) for 20 years, first at Ralph McCall School and now at Meadowbrook. As part of the committee at each school, she has helped planned the Remembrance Day services. “A Remembrance Day service should be run with pride, not simply [as] something that needs to be done,” she said. “It would be my hope that our organization of a service will rub off on the younger generation, so that they, too, will always remember the importance of reflection.” This year, Remembrance Day will be emotional for Ponath, she said, as it’s the first she’ll mark without her dad. She said her father taught her the importance of never forgetting the sacrifice of military personnel. “He was very proud of his country and he was always talking about how proud he was to be a Canadian,” she said. “He’d talk about how lucky we are to live here and to have our rights and freedoms because of the sacrifice of war.”
