KINDERSLEY — The Wyman Building at the Kindersley and District Plains Museum will be on the move after harvest.
The 70-foot building, which had been storage for vintage equipment at the museum site will be moving 183 km north to a new home in Neilburg. There, it will become part of the facilities at the Manitou Pioneers Museum site.
“The Wyman Building is an open shed that has two sides open,” Kindersley and District Plains Museum board vice-chair Gary Hamilton said. “It was out on a farm and started its life as a machine shed in town to store steel. The Wymans farmed and had a Massey dealership in Kindersley, and they had a machine shop. When they closed down, they moved it out on to their farm. The museum got a hold of it and moved it back to town.”
It is estimated the Wyman Building was originally constructed in the 1920s. While it was storing tractors on the museum grounds, its open sides left machines at the mercy of birds lacking the same appreciation for care volunteers put into the antique equipment enjoyed by the museum’s estimated 2,500 annual visitors.
“Within three or four years (the tractors) were covered in pigeon crap,” Hamilton said.
As the Wyman family still owns the building, the museum board needed their consent before disposing of the structure. Hamilton noted the family requested if the building couldn’t stay at the Kindersley museum, another museum should be the new home.
As it happened, a representative from the Neilburg museum came by and asked what the plans were for the Wyman Building.
“We’ve got more equipment we have to get under a roof,” said Chris Makey, chair of the buildings committee of the Manitou Pioneers Museum board. “I just happened to be there when some guy was talking about either tearing it down or junk it, and I just said, ‘Really?’ It was just, what’s the chance of that happening? Not sure why they brought it up right then.”
As the Wyman family still owns the building, they needed to be consulted. Hamilton said a condition for the Kindersley museum to dispose of the building was that it had to go to another museum. This solution fit the bill, and met a need at both facilities.
“I guess they are in need of some buildings and it’s pretty expensive to build something new nowadays,” Hamilton said. “They saw an opportunity, so now it will come down after harvest.”
When the structure gets to Neilburg, it will provide shelter for unrestored vintage equipment.
“We have a shop like the Kindersley museum has for restoring equipment and we are running out of shed room,” Makey said. “There’s no point in fixing it up if it’s going to go back outside. It’s a start for us.”
Moving a 70-foot structure might seem hard, but Makey said a group of museum volunteers will go down to Kindersley to assess how they can transport the structure safely after the harvest is complete. Makey added blocks have been placed so the building doesn’t freeze into the ground while a plan is drawn up to get it to its new home.
The decision to move the structure was announced at the Kindersley museum’s meeting on Aug. 12.
