One of the first things you may notice when you visit the museum “why aren’t there more stories of women”? It was one of my first observations when I arrived as curator. In our post today, you will see pictures of four women – 3 of whom have been featured in the museum for some time, Colette Wilson, who was mayor of Mattawa for 13 years, just recently added. We have pictures of groups of women from the Women’s Institute – notice that they are identified by their husbands’ names. We’d like to correct this by identifying who they were as individuals. If you can help with identification, we would appreciate it.
The mission of the museum is “to be a reflection of our community through the use of photographs, stories, artefacts and documents”. Women make up less than 10% of the exhibits in the museum. The goal is to change this because we know that women made/make up much more than 10% of our community.
And here is where we’re asking for your help. A new exhibit area is being created and will be dedicated to the women, past and present, who helped form this community. We know that without them, without us, we wouldn’t have the strength of community that we have. Women not only raised families, but were activists, educators, caregivers, politicians, business owners, artists, authors, and volunteers.
We want to share their stories, our stories. This will be an area of commemoration and dedication. If you would like to be a part of this community project, please contact me at curator@mattawamuseum.ca
I look forward to hearing from you.
Judy Toupin, Curator #EmbraceEquity
