Crying shame of a CD

“Highway of Tears” CD ReleasedThe community is stepping out onto the Highway of Tears (the infamous stretch of road in British Columbia where seven young women have been the victims of unsolved murders.) A groundswell of private interests are releasing their own initiatives to draw funds and attention to the missing and murdered women of Highway 16, and all the circumstances of society that foster the violence. Ray Bessette is the most recent contributor, although his project was a long time in the making.

Last month he released a two-song CD from which the proceeds will go to pay for signage along Highway 16 warning of the grave dangers of hitchhiking. "If I can utilize my talents and my creativity for anybody I can't think of a better cause," Bessette told the Citizen. One song, Please Come Home, was written in 2004 as a tribute to missing hitchhiker Nicole Hoar. The other tune, Highway of Tears, co-written with Brent Brekkaas, came out of a meeting Bessette had with missing women advocate Tony Romeyn in 2005 followed soon after by the disappearance of hitchhiker Tamara Chipman.