Staff and students at Christ the King Catholic School in Wallaceburg paid tribute to Gord Downie, the late-front man for The Tragically Hip, the day after he passed away.
Patrick Demeter, a teacher at the school, was in charge of playing O Canada during the morning announcements on October 18.
“It was such a huge news story the night before when it happened,” Demeter told the Sydenham Current.
“So when it happened, I was like everyone else I think in Canada, just watching the news that night, watching all the clips and seeing everyone, even the Prime Minister, and how it was a big deal with him.”
Demeter said he will often look for something topical to include in the morning announcements at the school.
“So that morning when I came to school I just did a search on YouTube and I checked it out,” he said.
“It sounded pretty good so, for the O Canada that day we just did an opening and it said ‘ladies and gentleman, O Canada performed by Mr. Gord Downie.’ I think it was from an All-Star baseball game that he performed it and that is what I played for O Canada at the school.”
Demeter, who saw Downie and The Tragically Hip perform a few times himself, said many of the staff and students were happy with the O Canada choice.
“I got mostly teachers the rest of the day were saying ‘hey that was a good call on playing Gord on the announcements’ because they kind of know more about the Tragically Hip than some of the kids,” he said.
“But there was a few kids that were saying they knew about it and they had some Tragically Hip things on and their parents were talking about it the night before.”
Downie had an aggressive and incurable form of brain cancer called glioblastoma, which was discovered back in 2015.
The musician died surrounded by his children and family last month.
He was 53.
