It normally happens at the end of April (28), the Day of Mourning, in downtown Elliot Lake.
This year due to COVID-19 protocols, the memorialization of six former Elliot Lake miners is taking place Friday, (11 a.m.) at the Elliot Lake Miners' Memorial Wall on Highway 108, by Horne Lake.
There will be an induction ceremony, and Prospector's monument unveiling, followed by a community gathering at Collins Hall on Hillside North.
Janice Martell of Sudbury, the driving force behind the McIntyre Powder Project, will be on hand to see her father along with five other miners inducted onto the memorial wall.
During her keynote speech, the former Elliot Lake resident says it will be bittersweet for her as she focuses on the stories of the six miners; how they lived, worked, and contributed to their families and communities.
She notes three of the six being inducted are there due to the McIntyre Powder Project work, and their claims subsequently being recognized by WSIB for occupational disease.
The names of the six have been inscribed on the wall: James (Jim) Hobbs (Martell's father), Aimo (Moe) Salo, Oswald Hajek, Wayne Drysdale Sr., Lenard Alexander McKay, and Richard Abraham Dumas.
With the installation of the Prospector's monument, the trilogy of statues crafted by Merrickville, ON. based sculptor Laura Brown Breetvelt for the City of Elliot Lake, will now be complete at the lakeside Miners' Memorial. She too is an Elliot Lake native.
Following the monument ceremony, those gathered can go to the luncheon at the Collins Hall, where Martell will also be hosting information tables about the McIntyre Powder Project, a memorial display, and the work of the Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers on mining exposures and health.