From time to time we try to post suggestions about how museums, libraries, and other organizations can take part in the World War I Centennial.  By now regular readers know I often point to the National World War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City–and I won’t stop doing that!

But every now and then we need to see how someone not really close to Kansas is handling the centennial.  We turn north to the Niagara Historical Society at Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada.  Of course the Canadians were involved in the war much earlier than the Americans.  They’ve also been planning longer than many Americans.  Online one can find a workshop plan created in 2011.  We offer up the link here as perhaps it may inspire someone to steal a few ideas in good museum tradition!

http://niagarahistorical.museum/media/EducationalWorkshopDocument.pdf

I also like the idea that they put together a collection research guide:

http://niagarahistorical.museum/media/02.WWICollectionGuide.pdf

If you scroll down to the First World War on this page, you will also note that they’ve included links to other appropriate materials:

http://niagarahistorical.museum/collection/NiagarainWarPeace.html

Consider the possibilities for your communities . . .

 

Blair Tarr is the Museum Curator of the Kansas State Historical Society. He oversees the three-dimensional collections of the Society, but has special interests in the Civil War, Wichita-made Valentine diners, and Leavenworth's Abernathy Furniture. In the last few years he has also done a lot of cramming on The Great War. He is a past president of the Kansas Museums Association and the Civil War Round Tables of both Kansas City and Eastern Kansas. He is currently a board member of the Heritage League of Greater Kansas City.