Kevin’s Stories and Columns

Fort Whoop Up has been renovating their different exhibits since 2005, and should be finished this summer. Nearly $300,000 in donations and grants has allowed the Fort to complete some of the biggest changes in it’s history.

It started with upgrading a couple of exhibits, and once the funds were approved and partners got involved and donations started coming in, the process simply continued.

“Relating to the firearms side alone, we ended up receiving a provincial grant for $125,000 for the overall exhibit,” said Doran Degenstein, executive director at Fort Whoop Up. “We received an additional $71,000 from the City of Lethbridge from the community capital project. As a society, we raised another $55-60,000 to finish the project, and in addition to that, that’s where the in-kind donations started. It would be in the neighborhoods of $250-$350,000.”

Degenstein was quick to mention the contributors that have helped make the new exhibits possible, despite the costs.

“It’s expensive for us, we don’t enjoy near the funding that our counterparts in the city (Calgary) do,” said Degenstein. “By having these new exhibits and doing the upgrades, it just makes it easier to do the job, and it increases visitation. In addition to the reconstruction process, redoing exhibits, it’s allowed us to better interpret what we do have.”

“We’ve taken on more donations in terms of goods and materials in the past five years then we’ve enjoyed in a long time. So, here, we’re now sitting with 12 period rooms that are brimming with artifacts. We went from 10-12.”

Some new exhibits have also been added, including two new galleries, and Fort Whoop Up hopes to have everything completed by this summer.

“The Blackfoot Gallery has been added. The Crowshoe Gallery has been overhauled. We’ve redone the armory, the Northwest Mountain Police room, the Indian room, so there are some big changes.

“We had hoped to have everything wrapped up by May 18, and it’ll probably be done by July 1. If we don’t finish what we want to do by July 1, we will wait and pick up again after the Fur Trade Symposium (runs from Sept 9 to Sept 13).”

He says the majority of the construction is done, and a new security system has been added as well.

As part of the renovations Fort Whoop Up is in the process of doing, they have put together the largest historic gun collection in Canada, a project that has taken the last 12 years to create.

Currently, 200 guns are on display, and 400 more will be added by the end of the summer, and eventually, 800 guns will fill the secure cabinets. Most of the guns are from two museums, and some are from private donors, though the Fort did have to purchase some guns.

“When we started this project out, it had some major components to reconstruct the original fur wear house,” said Degenstein. “We needed to reconstruct the stable, We had recently  acquired the firearms collection from the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. It was just the right fit, trying to do a bit of a rejuvenation.”

They have had to purchase some, but most were donated.

The two largest contributors to the new collection are from museums in Calgary and Toronto, though there have been several private donations.

“The majority actually come from the Glenbow Museum, and the Royal Ontario,” said Degenstein. “We had 50-60 pieces of our own, then we had we had a collection of about 70-80 pieces come in, then we started to receive private donations.”

There are some very old firearms in the collection.

“Our oldest firearm dates back to approximately 1540,” he said. “The majority of the collection focuses on the fur trade, from the 1840s to the 1870s.”

One visitor to Fort Whoop Up, who just happened to be walking through at the time, commented on how impressed the gun collection is.

“Not so much the volume, but the different types of rifles, (and) shotguns,” said Roger Johnson, a retired weapons instructor for the recruits at Corrections Canada.
“I’ve seen a lot of big collections, but they were mostly the same type, from the Civil War, here, it’s much more diverse. I thought it was very impressive.”

Fort Whoop Up is welcoming visitors and tourists, though many of the exhibits are still being organized and upgraded. Each exhibit is kept clean and tidy, and in no way does on-going improvements impede the enjoyment of Fort.

Originally posted 2009-05-06 22:36:39. Republished by Old Post Promoter