Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum receives grant

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This article was published 21/09/2021 (1622 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum in Brandon is about to get a $23,800 grant as Manitoba 150 wraps up.

In partnership with the Manitoba government, the Manitoba 150 Host committee provided funding to events and projects across the province, a release stated on Monday.

As Manitoba 150 concludes, Manitoba’s Signature Museums will receive $166,000 to support their work to capture and preserve the province’s history, interim Premier Kelvin Goertzen and Sport, Culture and Heritage Minister Cathy Cox announced.

“There is no better time than in the celebration of our sesquicentennial to provide additional support to Manitoba’s Signature Museums so they can continue to share the stories of our past, which provide important learning opportunities for Manitobans and visitors of all ages,” Goertzen said.

The funding is timely, said Stephen Hayter, executive director of the Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum.

“We just discovered, from the preservation issue, we will be having some roof repairs. I don’t know what they’re going to cost. It’s something we’ll have to look at as a complete board,” he said.

And in order to present curriculum-based education programs at the museum, preservation of the museum is key.

However, with the pandemic, there have not been school groups touring the museum for the last two years.

Hayter said the museum is always looking at funding for education programs.

School groups for the museum are key, he said. However, the pandemic has put a damper on that activity.

“We have an education committee that’s working on getting school groups back into the museum. Maybe there needs to be funding to make that happen,” he said.

“With the funding we just received, great. Now that’s an opportunity,” he said.

“Displays are always something we want to improve at the museum. Certainly talked for quite some time [about] how we could improve. There’ll just be too many wonderful projects in the end. What a wonderful gift that Manitoba 150 has provided to us, so we can ensure that A, the preservation of this building continues; and B, that we can improve some of the areas that we’re passionate about, like education programming and displays,” he said.

Hayter said the board will have to decide ultimately what are the museum’s priorities.

“This money will certainly help in furthering a lot of them,” he said.

“We’ll certainly want to be accessing other things as well as we go forward with some of these projects. These are long-term projects. Our education program has always been an evolution. And certainly, our displays have always been that way.”

A display could be an aircraft, which can cost up to $100,000. Smaller displays can either be professionally developed or worked on by the committed volunteers at the museum, he said.

“We’ve always been told people always enjoy the ambiance of the museum. We don’t want to cover that up. We want to enhance that. How we go about doing that is the question.”

From the basic standpoint, he said, preservation of the building has to be a priority.

“We can’t have roofs leaking.”

Each of the province’s seven designated signature museums will receive $23,800 as a grant that could be used for school and youth programming, exhibits, improving visitor experience or other improvements to the facilities that would support the mandate of conserving and promoting Manitoba’s history.

“Manitoba’s Signature Museums are well known for their excellent programming, high-quality exhibits and visitor experiences, and we look forward to how they will continue to capture and preserve Manitoba’s history for generations to come,” Cox said.

“Manitoba 150 is thrilled to invest in these amazing organizations that tell our collective stories and preserve Manitoba’s history for future generations,” Manitoba 150 Host Committee co-chairs Monique LaCoste and Stuart Murray stated in a release.

The signature museums program was established in 1998 through the designation of selected museums with the potential to be significantly enhanced as heritage tourism attractions.

The seven museums are designated as Travel Manitoba Star Attractions. They are the Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum in Brandon, the New Iceland Heritage Museum in Gimli, the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada in Winnipeg, the Mennonite Heritage Village in Steinbach, the Manitoba Agricultural Museum in Austin, Le Musée de Saint-Boniface Museum in Winnipeg and the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden.

“We’re thrilled to get the funding,” Hayter said. “We will use the funding to the best of our ability.”

» kkielley@brandonsun.com