The Names in Stone, and the Futures They Took With Them

Bob stood there longer than he planned.

The snow had been packed down by boots, generations of them, and the cold had that sharp Toronto bite that makes you slow down whether you want to or not. In front of him were names—hundreds of them—carved into stone. Not headlines. Not statistics. Names.

On one wall, more than five hundred names from the First World War. On another, inside the Peace Tower, over six hundred names from the Second World War. Quiet rows of letters, each one once attached to a voice, a laugh, a set of hands that could build, teach, heal, invent.

Bob raised his camera, then lowered it again.

Some moments aren’t about getting the shot right away.

These were people who never got to grow old in Canada. They never stood in line for coffee on a cold morning. Never complained about transit delays. Never argued about hockey trades or election results. They never had the chance to fail, to try again, to surprise the country they helped protect.

And Bob couldn’t help thinking:

How many of them could have been the next great minds of Canada?

How many teachers never taught their first class?

How many engineers never designed a bridge?

How many doctors never healed a patient?

How many artists never painted, wrote, or composed the work that would have changed how we see ourselves?

Then another thought crept in—one closer to Bob’s world.

How many families never existed because these lives were cut short?

How many children were never born?

How many grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and future relatives never got the chance to walk these streets?

And among all those missing generations, Bob wondered:

How many of them would have been out on the streets of Toronto with a camera?

How many would have photographed streetcars grinding through winter snow?

How many would have captured kids playing road hockey in lane ways?

How many would have documented construction workers, market vendors, parades, protests, quiet mornings, and loud nights?

Every name on those walls isn’t just one lost life—it’s entire family trees that never branched out. Entire photo albums that were never filled. Entire stories of Toronto life that were never seen, framed, or remembered.

When we talk about war, we often talk about sacrifice in abstract terms. But standing in front of those walls, it becomes painfully specific. Every name is a future that stopped mid-sentence—and countless futures that never even got to start.

As a street photographer, Bob spends his days chasing small moments: a glance, a gesture, someone passing through the frame for a fraction of a second. But here, the moments are frozen forever. No motion blur. No second chance.

Bob finally took the photo—not to capture the stone, but to remember the weight of it.

Because remembrance isn’t just about honouring the dead.

It’s about recognizing what was stolen from the future.

And on a cold Toronto day, standing quietly among names carved in stone, Bob was reminded that every life matters—not just for who they were, but for all the streets, stories, and photographs that never had the chance to exist.

Here is how many descendants there  would be from all the soldiers.

You mentioned ~500 names (WWI wall) + ~600 names (WWII Peace Tower) ≈ 1,100 soldiers.

If those 1,100 had lived and later had families, the number of relatives alive today could easily be in the tens of thousands.

A simple way to think about it:

Conservative scenario:

1 child per person on average who would have had kids

2 grand kids per original person

4 great-grand kids

That’s roughly 7 descendants per soldier → 1,100 × 7 = 7,700 descendants.

Moderate scenario (pretty plausible over 80–110 years):

2 children

4 grand kids

8 great-grand kids

That’s 14 descendants per soldier → 1,100 × 14 = 15,400 descendants.

High scenario (bigger families were common earlier):

3 children

7–9 grand kids

15–25 great-grand kids

That can be 25–35+ descendants per soldier → 1,100 × 25 to 35 = 27,500 to 38,500 descendants.

And that’s just direct descendants. If you include “relatives” more broadly—spouses, in-laws, cousins created by those missing family branches—the number grows even more.

So a reasonable answer, based on demographic math, is:

Somewhere around ~8,000 to ~40,000 people (or more) might exist today as descendants of those ~1,100 soldiers—if they’d lived to have families.