Al Wallace was born in Toronto in1920 on Brock Avenue (which was off Bloor Street). Al and his family lived on Gladstone Avenue. He went to Dovercourt Public School, which was on Hallam Street, and he graduated in 1938. After this, he went to Central Tech for one year. However, Al was unable to go back to school after this, as he quit school to find a job and help out at home. Al remembers chumming around with some of his friends ; he also remembered that sports was the main entertainment. Al eventually went to Loblaw’s and put in an application there for a job – two weeks later, they called him and told him which store he needed to go to. He also joined the army reserve and subsequently joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in Jan. 1941. He attended the BCATP schools and made his way overseas. He and his crew were then transferred to a base in the north of England – the RAF Middleton St George/419 Bomber Squadron. Al was an air gunner and he did fifteen and a half air operations with his crew at 419. One night, on a trip to the city of Duisburg in the Ruhr Valley, the plane was shot down. Al was taken as a POW and spent the remainder of the war in German prison camps, including Stalag Luft III, where the “Great Escape” took place.
Al Wallace visited Crestwood in September 2014 and February 2015, where he was interviewed for this project by Aidan Reilly, Guanghao Chen, Amal Ismail-Ladak, Andy Cai and Matti MacLachlan.
Videos
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- 1. Al Wallace - Early Life; The Great Depression.mp4
- 2. Prewar Entertainment and Work.mp4
- 3. Work, Part Two; Enlisting.mp4
- 4. Training in Canada.mp4
- 5. Training with Equipment.mp4
- 6. Travelling to England.mp4
- 7. Friendships and Training.mp4
- 8. The Crew.mp4
- 9. Missions .mp4
- 10. The Final Mission.mp4
- 11. Shot Down.mp4
- 12. Bail Out.mp4
- 13. Prison.mp4
- 14. The Fate of the Other Airmen.mp4
- 15. Becoming a POW; The Great Escape.mp4
- 16. Stalag Luft 3.mp4
- 17. Head Counts.mp4
- 18. Describing the Camp .mp4
- 19. The Guards; Strategic Bombing.mp4
- 20. Creating the Great Escape.mp4
- 21. Organizing the Great Escape.mp4
- 22. The Great Escape Outcome.mp4
- 23. Letters and Food.mp4
- 24. Hogan's Heroes.mp4
- 25. Liberation.mp4
- 26. Liberation; Back in London.mp4
- 27. On the Farm.mp4
- 28. Back to England.mp4
- 29. Last Days in Europe; Return to Toronto.mp4
- 30. Back to the Real World; VJ Day.mp4
- 31. Postwar Adjustment; Volunteering.mp4
- 32. PTSD; Remembrance Day.mp4
- 33. The Great Escape- Myth and Reality.mp4
