Genevieve Bergeron. Nathalie Croteau. Anne-Marie Edward. Maryse Laganiere. Anne-Marie Lemay. Michele Richard. Annie Turcotte. Helene Colgan. Barbara Daigneault. Maud Haviernick. Maryse LeClair. Sonia Pelletier. Annie St-Arneault. Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz.
These are the 14 women we remember every December 6. They were killed on that day in 1989 because they were women, by a man who blamed his problems on feminists.
Sadly, they weren't alone then and they're not alone now. Statistics Canada reports that 50 per cent of women in Canada have been victims of either a sexual or physical assault, most of them under the age of 25.
The massacre at L'Ecole Polytechnique, a school for engineering in Montreal, came at the hands of Marc Lepine. He entered the school and ordered all of the men out of a classroom.
He then opened fire, killing the women named above. He wounded another nine women and four men before fatally shooting himself.
Every year his terrible crime is marked with solemn ceremonies across the country, including Toronto.
"Any act of violence against women and girls is a violation of their fundamental human rights and is a barrier to their full participation in society," Mayor David Miller announced in a press release.
"We join with the families and friends of the young women who were killed in Montreal as we continue to mourn their loss to us and the contributions they would have made."
Though it's difficult to find good in Lepine's terrible crime, it did help inspire the
White Ribbon Campaign. In that initiative, men work on ending violence against women with a focus on educating men and boys.
"All women have the right to live in safe communities, free from violence and the threat of violence to themselves and their children," outlined Councillor Pam McConnell, Chair of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities' Women's Committee.
"We must remember that the root causes of violence against women are structural and come from an imbalance of power. This day focuses us on the need to work together at the local and national levels to eradicate this violence."
CityNews Rewind: See our our original coverage of the Montreal massacre and read Lepine's suicide note
Image: 2007 Ceremony at Women's College Hospital.