West Hants Museum offers window to the past, present

By Brent Fox

The Hants Journal/NovaNewsNow.com

A used noose, a letter of thanks from an Israeli prime minister, shipping artifacts and detailed genealogy records are there. Those and a whole whack of other things from Hants County’s history are available to view at the West Hants Historical Society Museum, 281 Kings Street, Windsor.

Operated by the West Hants Historical Society, the museum has its summer staff and hours and is ready to host individual and group tours into heritage.

The museum is open Tuesdays to Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Genealogist and volunteer Lilla Siderius is on hand to guide the summer staff – Sarah Balloch, Ashleigh Rowe and Ben Mitchell.

Through an agreement with Parks Canada, the museum and society are also responsible for staffing the nearby Fort Edward site. James Cloghesy is this year’s staff member at the fort.

Siderius said that groups such as the nursing homes book tours each summer, and sometimes nursery schools will, too.

But people visit the museum and genealogy collection from all over, she noted, including across Canada, the United States and Europe, even Australia.

“These are people with Hants County roots,” Siderius said. “Everything we have here pertains to Hants County.”

The museum took over its current location, a former church site, in 1990. And, as businesses modernized or closed, they donated display cases – some quite antique and valuable – to the museum, where they are put to good use.

The summer job has been an education for Rowe, who works in genealogy at the museum. She said, “I’ve learned so much. It’s all interesting.” This includes the subjects such as the town fire and the fort.

Balloch, who is a guide, noted that she had participated in Katimavik and had worked in three communities, so it was from this point of view that she increased her interest in her home community. And it’s not just the distant past, she said. “You hear what’s going on in town in the present… not just history, but up to now.”

Mitchell is digitalizing the museum’s extensive photo archives and has logged about 3,000 photos so far. “I hope to finish the photo archives this summer.”

The museum exhibits artifacts from a number of aspects of the Hants County of the past, including school materials, shipping, law enforcement, Fort Edward, and the Acadians. There is also an extensive collection from the former South Rawdon museum.

The society offers a large number of publications for sale at the museum, including those on Hants County communities, cemeteries, and families. Authors include well-known ones such as John Duncanson, L.S. Loomer, Edith Mosher and Maribelle Smiley. Prices range from $3 up to $35, depending on the size of the book or reprint.

From the gory -- the noose -- to the more cultured – a small exhibit on writer, publisher and businesswoman the late Kay Anslow -- the museum offers a wide spectrum of the county’s heritage.