Peter Kirk was born on March 25, 1936 and achieved his goal of becoming a police officer when he was appointed to the O.P.P. on April 13, 1959. He served on the Ontario Provincial Police for nine years and spent his entire career at Hawkesbury, near the Quebec border.

Constable Kirk was thirty-two years old and in the prime of his life when he went to work on June 8, 1968. Early the next morning he was travelling west in his marked black and white cruiser on a stretch of Highway 17 between Alfred and L’Original. Coming in the opposite direction was an inexperienced eighteen-year-old driver operating a TR-3 Triumph convertible. As he passed a group of cars that Constable Kirk had been following, the young driver allowed his sports car to drift onto the soft gravel shoulder. He overcorrected and cross the centre line and shot right into the oncoming lane.

The police cruiser struck the smaller vehicle and rolled twice before coming to rest in the north ditch. Constable Peter Kirk was killed in the accident.

Peter was survived by his wife and two children.