Bill Ward celebrated a milestone birthday earlier this year and this week he was presented with a Quilt of Valour.

The World War II veteran lives on an acreage west of Airdrie. He turned 100 this past May and is still healthy enough to live alone, having lost his wife 14 years ago. However, his daughter lives nearby on the same land.

Members of Veterans Brotherhood Canada drove out to see Ward on Monday and presented him with the handmade quilt and an Izzy doll that one of the members knits for veterans.

"The Izzy doll is more to give them comfort than anything else, so it's a tradition we carry on with any veteran that we happen to come across, including our own members," said Veterans Brotherhood Canada President Ron Collins.

Ward was given one of the quilts at an outdoor presentation ceremony at his family's acreage. He was asked about his time in the service.

"I bounced around all over the place," Ward said. "I joined up in Calgary. I joined up as a butcher and as a mechanic. I went to trade school in London, Ontario for probably a year. Then I got shipped overseas. I got to Aldershot and wound up in the butcher shop there. I was there for maybe two months. They come to me one day and they said they'd formed this new thing called REME, which was Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers."

Ward opted to join REME and worked on military tanks. He spent time in Sicily, southern Italy, France, and Belgium as a Private during the Second World War and was stationed in Holland when the war ended.

After that he came back to Calgary, where he worked as a mechanic for many years and raised a family, which now includes eight great-grandchildren.

Collins said members of the Veterans Brotherhood Canada were thrilled to learn about Ward's service and pay their respect.

"We are a group that is social in nature and we're veteran based," said Collins, adding many of the members are motorcycle enthusiasts. "We provide a safe environment, and a friendly environment, and a 100 per cent acceptable environment for veterans."