Volunteers operating the Kamsack Power House Museum are eager to encourage residents to spend some time in February to seriously reflect on the importance of history, their heritage and the cultures that have assembled to create this community.
Meeting at the museum last week, its planning committee, which is about to launch an initiative towards the construction of a new sheltered area for artifacts, tossed out the question: “Why is the museum important to the people of Kamsack and something that warrants support?”
In addition to being an excellent repository of artifacts of residents’ past, committee members said that the facility provides indirect spinoff economic benefits.
“For example, last year we had two busloads of visitors at the museum and I’m sure that when they left town, it was not with empty stomachs,” said Cliff Paluck, a member of the planning committee.
In addition to food, people visiting the museum may make use of the RV park facilities, gasoline, golf and general shopping, he said.
People have come to this museum from around the world, he said. The museum is unique. In it is an extraordinarily strong link to the residents.
To prove the point, Paluck produced a list of the locations from which visitors to the museum have come over the past eight years. People have visited from 105 locations in Saskatchewan; 153 locations from the other nine provinces and the Yukon; from seven states of the USA; five places in Germany; two locations in each of England and Ireland, and from at least one location in each of Mexico, Nicaragua, Scotland, the Netherlands, South Africa, Kenya, Thailand, Italy and Australia.
“The problem we have is that many of the larger pieces of equipment that show how early pioneers harvested their crops, farmed their land and generally moved around in the early years of the 1900s have soft materials of wood, rubber and/or canvas that simply cannot stand up to the rigors of being displayed outdoors 24/7 year round,” said Marv McKay, another member of the planning committee.
Equipment that has been so displayed for decades now is deteriorating and current potential donors are extremely reluctant to consider additional donor pieces if they are to be left unprotected from weather and rodents.
McKay said that the planning committee had therefore focused its attention on the feasibility of constructing a 60-foot by 100-foot metal clad building which would be used to house and display the more vulnerable equipment and encourage future donors.
Paluck produced a sketch of the museum grounds and the location of the proposed storage building, immediately east of the old water treatment plant adjacent to the Power House.
In November, town council approved the site plan for the new storage building at the museum which would enable the museum board to proceed with acquiring a building permit.
The museum board and its planning committee are not interested in deficit financing, therefore board members have agreed to begin an appeal for finances next month.
Depending primarily on donations, the museum can handle a portion of the cost of this proposed storage facility while leaving itself a reserve fund to cover annual operation and maintenance costs, he said. “In order to raise the remainder of the cost for the storage facility, the committee plans to hold a community fundraiser.
“We plan to approach major businesses as well as smaller retail businesses and members of the public with requests for pledges,” Paluck explained, adding that the committee would not proceed with any project, unless it can cover all costs of the facility.
It will not be until after the pledging phase is completed and that it has been decided that the target amount could be raised, that donors will be asked to make their pledges good.
“If we are unsuccessful in raising our shortfall, then our committee would have to regroup, possibly shelve our plans or consider a smaller, less desirable building,” Paluck said.
