Instead of just a small exhibit of artifacts from the city's own collection, council agreed Monday to partner with Brock University to develop a display that will fill the entire second floor of the St. Catharines Museum.

Brock has offered to take the lead in organizing the exhibit and applying to the Department of Canadian Heritage's Bicentennial of the War of 1812 fund for money, said parks and recreation director Rick Lane in a report to council.

The exhibit would be 1,500 square feet and also include lectures and workshops "telling the story of the War of 1812 in the community in a meaningful way," wrote Lane.

The city would host the exhibit and would need to provide window shades for the second floor windows to prevent sunlight from harming the artifacts, while Brock would provide artifacts from its collection and a faculty member to be the project leader.

The exhibit would open by late summer, wrote Lane, and "feature interactive elements and hands-on interpretive elements that will bring the story to life and help visitors understand the impact of the War of 1812 (including) the local story and the eventual building of the Welland Canal."

Brock University has several significant artifacts in its collection, including a lock of Sir Isaac Brock's hair, documents from that era and a replica of a coat worn by Brock when he died.

In other 1812 news, members of the budget committee agreed to recommend the city's support of a $25,000 grant request from Club LaSalle to commission a bronze statue to commemorate three people the club is calling "First Canadians:" Dominique Ducharme, Laura Secord and William Johnson Kerr. But the money should be paid out in three installments over three years, agreed the budget committee, and only if the group is successful in getting the rest of the project's $275,000 cost covered by fundraising and other levels of government.

View the article source