'He's in our hearts': Family and friends still seek answers one year after Nathan Wise’s disappearance
It’s been a year since Nathan Wise went missing and his family is no closer to finding out what happened to him.
For years, Jack Paley didn’t talk much about his military past.
The Second World War veteran, who turned 100 on Thursday, was part of an elite British group — the Special Air Service (SAS). In downtown Toronto, at the Historic Royal Canadian Military Institute, there was a procession for Paley to mark his monumental birthday.
“I made it -- how, I don't know,” Paley said with humour. "I'm just same as ever.”
Paley, with his wife of 70 years by his side, was presented with a cake that proudly noted his role within the SAS, a secretive group that until recently, even his own children knew little about.
“I used to think he was a spy as a kid — because it was very secretive and so we didn't hear a lot about it,” said Anne Ison, Paley’s daughter. “Last few years has been eye opening, humbling."
The SAS was born in the north African desert, where a young British officer in 1941 named David Stirling created a commando force — small bands of soldiers who could be parachuted in behind enemy lines and generally cause havoc.
Their motto: who dares wins.
"A lot of the work that they did is still confidential because of the nature of the work and assassinating German officers and all sorts of things like that,” Alan Bell, a former Special Air Services operator, told CTV News.
Famously, Hitler ordered that soldiers like those in the SAS were to be executed if captured.
“Oh, they shot them on the spot, yeah,” Paley said.
Still, Paley, born in England, bravely joined up and went on daring operations behind the lines in Italy and France.
"We were to train the Maquis — the French Resistance — with different weapons,” he said. “Bazookas, machine guns and mostly plastic grenades. We had to show them how to put it under the railway line."
Paley now lives in Markham, Ont., and is only the third member of the SAS to make it to 100 years old.
To this day, he’s humble about his contribution, and honoured to have it acknowledged by other vets.
“Yeah, it’s just one of those things,” he said.
With files from CTVNews.ca's Alexandra Mae Jones
It’s been a year since Nathan Wise went missing and his family is no closer to finding out what happened to him.
Dozens of Ontarians are expressing frustration in the province’s health-care system after their family doctors either dropped them as patients or threatened to after they sought urgent care elsewhere.
An Ottawa pizzeria is being recognized as one of the top 20 deep-dish pizzas in the world.
Amazon's paid subscription service provides free delivery for online shopping across Canada except for remote locations, the company said in an email. While customers in Iqaluit qualify for the offer, all other communities in Nunavut are excluded.
The fire burning near Fort McMurray grew from 25 hectares to 5,500 hectares over the weekend.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin began a Cabinet shakeup on Sunday, proposing the replacement of Sergei Shoigu as defence minister as he begins his fifth term in office.
Police are searching for a male suspect after a man was “slashed in neck” on Sunday morning in downtown Toronto and died.
There were some scary moments for several people on a northern Ontario highway caught on video Thursday after a chain reaction following a truck fire.
Health Canada announced various product recalls this week, including electric adapters, armchairs, cannabis edibles and vehicle components.
English, history, entertainment, math and geography: high school trivia teams could be quizzed on any of it when they compete at the Reach for the Top Nationals in Ottawa in June.
An Ottawa pizzeria is being recognized as one of the top 20 deep-dish pizzas in the world.
A family of fifth generation farmers from Ituna, Sask. are trying to find answers after discovering several strange objects lying on their land.
A Listowel, Ont. man, drafted by the Hamilton Tigercats last week, is also getting looks from the NFL, despite only playing 27 games of football in his life.
The threat of zebra mussels has prompted the federal government to temporarily ban watercraft from a Manitoba lake popular with tourists.
A small Ajax dessert shop that recently received a glowing review from celebrity food critic Keith Lee is being forced to move after a zoning complaint was made following the social media influencer’s visit last month.
The Canada Science and Technology Museum is inviting visitors to explore their poop. A new exhibition opens at the Ottawa museum on Friday called, 'Oh Crap! Rethinking human waste.'
The Regina Police Service says it is the first in Saskatchewan and possibly Canada to implement new technology in its detention facility that will offer real-time monitoring of detainees’ vital health metrics.
Just as she had feared, a restaurant owner from eastern Quebec who visited Montreal had her SUV stolen, but says it was all thanks to the kindness of strangers on the internet — not the police — that she got it back.