Archives Awareness Week 2009: Day 1
April 6th, 2009
Got the mini-exhibits set up last week in a hurry, and began running the public tours today. So far those tours have included television, radio, and print media, a couple of “regular” researchers, a city councillor, and a single new member of the general public. A decent start, though. Later this week we have city staff, heritage committees, a Grade 5 class, and another day of “public.” By the end of it I’ll probably have some things memorized that I never expected to.
So what’s this table about, then? Turns out that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, stopped in Fort William one afternoon in 1914 and bought a piece of land on a whim. (It was an investment property — he was just that taken by the city’s potential. As far as I can tell he wasn’t in the habit of buying land in Canadian cities he’d never been to before.) The exhibit uses this property, and the famous name attached to it, to demonstrate the variety of resources that the Archives has for researching the history of land and buildings. People use these to find out who used to live in their houses. (Hint: not Sir Arthur.)
Incidentally, the place is now a bakery (and a pretty good one.)
We also have set up a display of maquettes of public art, a display of assorted visual materials (photos, maps, blueprints) and a couple of “strange but true” files (including one documenting the controversial move to accept Daylight Savings Time in painstaking detail.)
A full set of photographs can be found here, on my flickr account.