Toronto – On June 26, 2010, nearly 700 people gathered at Cedarvale Park, Georgetown, to witness the official unveiling of the plaque, designating the Georgetown Boys Farmhouse as a historic and protected municipal site. In the presence of His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos, the Halton Hills Mayor, as well as several dignitaries, the landmark was officially integrated within the Halton Hills historic landscape.

“The Town of Halton Hills is proud to designate Cedarvale Park under Part IV of the Ontario Heritage Act,” said Rick Bonnette, Halton Hills Mayor. “Town Council recognizes the important role of the Armenian Farm School, as it was then known, played in the 1920s with the arrival of 109 Armenian orphaned boys and two girls who called Georgetown their first Canadian home.”

For the past two years, the Armenian National Committee of Toronto (ANCT) has been working to have the Georgetown Armenian Boys Farmhouse, presently known as the Cedarvale Community Centre, designated as a protected historic and cultural site. Between 1923 and 1927, a total number of 138 Armenian children, who were orphaned during the Ottoman Empires systematic genocide against the Armenians, were brought to Canada by the Armenian Relief Association and raised in what is currently known as the Cedarvale Community Centre.

“The Georgetown farm serves as a constant reminder of the Armenian Genocide, and remind us of the lessons we need to learn from history in the hopes of preventing future cases of genocide,” said Raffi Sarkissian, ANCT Chairperson. “The memory of the Georgetown Boys will be preserved through this designation, as the building will serve as a permanent memorial site commemorating the Armenian Genocide and Canada’s role in saving Armenian lives.”
In 1923, Cedarvale Farm was the site of Canada’s first international humanitarian resettlement effort, rescuing orphans of the Armenian Genocide.

On this special occasion the president of the Armenian National Committee of Canada (ANCC) Dr. Girair Basmadjian expressed gratitude towards the Canadian people of the period for that particulate humanitarian act and to the Cedarville council for preserving the historic site as witness to the positive role that played in the Armenian Genocide. A role that this country pursued by its objective and honest press coverage at the time and recently by the acknowledgement and condemnation of this Genocide by the parliament and the current Government, concluded Dr. Basmadjian.

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The ANCC is the largest and the most influential Canadian-Armenian grassroots political organization. Working in coordination with a network of offices, chapters, and supporters throughout Canada and affiliated organizations around the world, the ANCC actively advances the concerns of the Canadian-Armenian community on a broad range of issues.

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Le CNAC est l'organisation politique canadienne-arménienne la plus large et influentielle. Collaborant avec une série de bureaux, chapitres et souteneurs à travers le Canada et des organisations affiliées à travers le monde, le CNAC s'occupe activement des inquiétudes de la communauté canadienne-arménienne.