Sea of White Gloves

Song created by Les Pyke

The Story Behind the Song

In December 1997 I was hired by the Waterloo Regional Police Service as a constable. I was then sent to the Ontario Police College to receive training along with over 200 recruits from different police services from all over Ontario. During a class on death notification, which took place in the auditorium with the entire intake of recruits, the instructor asked if anyone had any experiences to share. A brave young recruit from another police service stood and spoke of his father, who was also a police officer. His father was tragically killed in the line of duty. This young recruit spoke of the hurt and pain of losing his father at such a young age and the memories of this horrible incident. Through tears, he expressed that the most profound memory was all the white gloves at the police funeral patting him on the back and saying it would be okay. The memory of this recruit stuck with me for years.

In 2007, I was asked by a colleague to write a song for a charity album. The charity album was to be a collection of songs written by police officers. I wrote the song, Sea of White Gloves, inspired by that young recruit. The album never came to fruition; however, the same colleague was kind enough to produce the song in his music studio, playing most of the instruments himself. The song was shared with close friends and colleagues on different occasions, but mostly it remained an unheard story.

After a lengthy career and several stints in specialty branches, I returned to patrol in 2021 to complete a full circle, ending my career where I started it—working the streets of downtown Kitchener. Unfortunately, in my first year back, I attended three police funerals of officers killed in the line of duty in Ontario. Through different conversations with fellow officers during these sad times, I shared the song. The officers encouraged me to release it. I contacted Jason Barry, a Juno Award–winning producer, and asked if he would produce it. Jason agreed to do it and graciously composed a new sound for it, played all the instruments, and added backing vocals himself. I travelled to New Brunswick to add my vocal, and Sea of White Gloves was modernized with a professional tone.

Throughout the life span of the song, I always wondered if I should contact the young police recruit who inspired it. One thought was that it might be too painful to bring up such an event from long ago. Since I was going to put the song on YouTube, I located the officer through a close friend of his and sent him the song.

The officer told me that he loved the song and was grateful I sent it to him. He told me that the speech he gave that day back at OPC had been commented on by many officers over the years. He shared with me a newspaper clipping picture of him and his brother standing beside his father’s casket, with two officers in number one dress uniform, complete with white gloves, supporting them. He carries the clipping in his wallet every day to remind him why he is a police officer. The picture, recreated by two young artists in sketch form, became the initial cover for the song. Although this police officer is in full support of the song, he wishes to remain anonymous. The song “Sea of White Gloves” was released on YouTube several years ago in audio format. More recently, the song has also been released as a video (above).

— Les Pyke, song writer.