Ron Arsenault wants his father’s 100th birthday to be an unforgettable one.

On Sunday evening during the 2020 Super Bowl, the longtime Scarborough resident posted a photo of his father Pte. Fred Arsenault, a decorated Second World War veteran, on his Facebook profile holding a poster that asked people to send him 100 birthday cards for his 100th birthday on March 6.

Overnight, Arsenault’s post was shared dozens of times and has since gone viral.

“I thought everyone would be watching the Super Bowl. By Monday morning our story was on Reddit and by yesterday afternoon Mayor Tory was sharing it,” he said early Tuesday afternoon. Arsenault said he first heard about the 100 cards idea online when Jim South, a Second World War veteran from Texas, made a similar wish and received 100,000 cards for his 100th birthday on Oct. 7, 2019.

“We sent him a card,” said Arsenault, who figured this concept would resonate with his father as he often spoke about reading letters from his mother in the middle of the night while serving in the trenches during the Second World War in Italy.

Arsenault said over the years his dad, who lived in Scarborough with him and his wife Betty for a decade before going to live at Sunnybrook Veterans Centre last May, “always had a thing for the mail” and figured he’d get a kick out of all of this.

Arsenault, who is 63, visits his father, who is originally from Prince Edward Island, but lived in East York for several years until moving back to the island in 1980 upon his retirement, almost daily. He’s sure his father will enjoy reading all the cards he’ll receive.

“The bottom line is all of this is for (dad) and the other vets. They mean the world to me,” said Arsenault, who said he’s informed Canada Post of his fun experiment.

“Can I cut you short? I just saw the mailman. We’ve got to have a discussion,” he chuckled before concluding the interview.

Anyone interested in sending a greeting card to Pte. Fred Arsenault should mail it to 9 Kenmore Ave., Toronto, ON M1K 1B3.

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