Chronicling the pioneer-era people and places of the southern Alberta drybelt since 2009. Alberta Heritage Resources Foundation Heritage Awareness Award recipient.
Brooks Museum First World War exhibit features #WW1 trench
The Brooks and District Museum have put together an exhibit commemorating the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War. The exhibit provides an overview of the Great War, and chronicles the role of local residents in the global conflict.
A display case is full to the brim with wartime memorabilia including German Pickelhaubes and “potato mashers”; a portrait entitled “March to the Battlefield or Canada’s Men on the Way”; wartime medals loaned by local families; and a portrait of Cpl. William “Bill” Beresford of Millicent, a veteran of wars in South Africa, India and Europe.A “swagger stick”, standard issue for officers of the Great War. The description reads: “A short stick carried by officers that showed their authority. It helped them keep their hands out of their pockets and could be used for punishment.” It’s rumoured to be similar to the kind used by the Hon. Alison Redford to keep the Premier’s office in line.A replica of a battlefront casualty clearing station, featuring Canadian nurses called “bluebirds”, so named for their distinctive blue and white attire.As the first tank of the Somme rumbles off into a sodden shell crater, visitors are invited to venture into a replica of a WW1 trench.Inside the trench a lonely old soul, crouching low to avoid sniper fire and shrapnel, pines for days of yore out on the homestead at Tide Lake where the meadowlark and the warm prairie breeze, not trench foot and vermin, were his constant companions.
