THE VILLAGE VoiceVOLUME 8 NO. 2 • OCTOBER 2020 KICKSTARTING PEACE #MUSEUMATHOME Agreement #40033605Agreement www.mhv.ca MAY 2013 1 PUBLISHED BY Mennonite Heritage Village (Canada) Inc. EXECUTIVE EDITOR Gary Dyck EDITOR KEYWORD: INNOVATION Patrick Friesen BY GARY DYCK, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR CONTRIBUTORS Gary Dyck Evelyn Friesen Jo-Ann Friesen Everywhere you look at the Mennonite Heritage Village (MHV) Andrea Klassen there is innovation. The housebarns, the windmill, the blacksmith Kara Suderman shop, the printery were all great innovations that served their Abby Toews community well. We still have a lot to learn from the ingeniousness Beth Peters of our foreparents. Raelyn Dick This year our exhibit is celebrating Mennonite Central Committee’s PRINTED BY (MCC) 100 year anniversary. MCC is one of the most innovative Derksen Printers groups in the world. They empowered people like George Klassen DESIGNED BY to make a water pump that could add a second growing season Chez Koop for subsistence farmers in Bangladesh. They developed the Food Grains Bank, which mobilized farmers to plant a portion of their CHARITY NUMBER field for the world’s poor. You can see that pump, see beautiful 10363-393-RR0001 panels and almost touch some artefacts from their history in our AGREEMENT NUMBER Gehard Ens Gallery. 40033605 With COVID-19 comes more need for innovation and at the MHV HOURS we have developed a new way to do life in the village. We did * October - April not host Pioneer Days this year, but every other Saturday we had Gary Dyck Tuesday - Saturday: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m. ‘Demonstration Days’. Instead of 1000s of people coming, we had May - September 100s. Both those that came and the volunteers who interacted with Monday - Saturday: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m. them said it was a more meaningful season this way. We had to restructure the flow of our stores and Thursday 9 a.m. - 8 p.m. grounds and put hand sanitizer stands beside our heritage blacksmith shop, housebarn and windmill. * Outdoor buildings are closed Our Pioneer Day camps for kids filled up quickly, even when we added a third week. WINTER ADMISSION RATES This year I found that those who were on our grounds, enjoyed being in a beautiful setting and Adults $6.00 cherished the opportunity to be in a safe outdoor village where they know we were taking care of them and taking care of our Mennonite heritage. Enjoy this issue of Village Voice! I assure you there will be Seniors (65 & Older) $5.00 more good innovation coming to MHV next year too. Students (ages 13-22) $5.00 Children (ages 6-12) $3.00 Children FREE (ages 5 & under) MEMBERSHIP Annual Individual Membership** $30.00 (Season-long admission) #MUSEUMATHOME Annual Family Membership** $50.00 Season-long admission) BY ANDREA KLASSEN, SENIOR CURATOR Lifetime $500.00 ** Membership entitles you to vote at our annual On March 24, I went out into the dismantling our 2019 exhibit, The general meeting, and gives you FREE or reduced village to do my normal winter Russländer, and installing this year’s admission to other Signature Museums in Manitoba. rounds, checking that all was exhibit, MCC 100 Years, all work well outside with our heritage that required me to be on-site as Manitoba Signature Museums: buildings. As I stepped into the much as possible. The museum Animal Barn to feed our cats that was dark and, while there were live on the grounds year-round, I one or two other staff around our Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum stooped down to pet Gertrude, a large Village Centre most days, the Brandon, MB very friendly orange cat who has typical noise and bustle of visitors Le Musèe De Saint-Boniface Museum been with us for several years. It and colleagues was gone. Winnipeg, MB was such a routine thing, to feed In the midst of this uncertain Manitoba Agricultural Museum and water the cats out in the period, however, I started noticing Austin, MB village, but that day, that small how people were reaching out Mennonite Heritage Village act of normalcy felt like a gift and to each other in creative, unique, Steinbach, MB I stopped to snap a few quick and inspiring ways. A common pictures of Gertrude enjoying New Iceland Heritage Museum thread that I saw woven through some attention, basking in the Gimli, MB some of these responses to our sunshine of the open barn door. collective experience of being in The Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre Later, when I got back to my desk, a pandemic lockdown was that Morden, MB I shared the photos on Mennonite individuals and organizations Western Canada Aviation Museum Heritage Village’s (MHV) social simply used whatever they had, Winnipeg, MB media accounts, thinking that our be it resources, talents, or other community, like me, could also gifts, to make a difference: signs use something cute and normal, HOW TO REACH MHV with encouraging, hand-written like barn cats, at that moment. messages appeared in home Telephone 204.326.9661 A few days earlier, on March 19, as windows and posted on school Email [email protected] COVID-19 hit communities across fences; a cartoonist and children’s Canada, MHV had closed its doors The post that started MHV’s author that I follow on Instagram to the public. Many staff moved #museumathome campaign, Senior offered free colouring pages to her their work to their home-based Curator Andrea Klassen’s visit with followers; someone dressed up offices, but I was working on Gertrude the cat on March 24. like the Easter Bunny and paraded ...Continued on page 4 • Domestic & Industrial • Geothermal Drilling • Hydrofracking www.mhv.ca Water Supply Wells • Specialized Pipe Piling • Water Well Servicing 204-326-2485 1-888-794-WELL (9355) 2 The Village Voice www.mhv.ca AUXILIARY NEWS BY EVELYN FRIESEN, AUXILIARY MEMBER (OCTOBER 2020) As always, the well-tended gardens in and Senior curator, Andrea Klassen, expertly guided and jams and vegetables from the Village garden. around the Village have garnered countless us on an interesting tour of the present MCC Our fundraising efforts have been somewhat compliments throughout the summer season. Exhibit in the Gerard Ens Gallery. The fascinating hampered by the restrictions that COVID-19 The local Garden Club includes a host of exhibit left us with a renewed appreciation for the has recently placed on us. But through it all, ambitious volunteers—many of which are 100 years of volunteer efforts that tell the story the Village Quilters have kept on stitching—an Auxiliary members—who work many long hours of peacemaking and providing worldwide relief artful demonstration that is appreciated by many to keep the grounds looking beautiful. The MHV in times of disaster. To help fund the ongoing visitors to the Centre. At our August Quilt Raffle, Auxiliary was once again pleased to raise the needs of the curatorial department remains one Leona Carnegie of Linden MB—herself a quilter— monies for plants and shrubs and tools needed of the Auxiliary’s goals. was thrilled to learn that she had indeed won the for the year. stunning, navy/white quilt appropriately named “Counterbalance.”. UPCOMING! This is your invitation!!!! Join us for lunch at the annual Christmas Market in the Village. We will be providing a light lunch in the Multi-Purpose Room. In the meantime, watch for upcoming activities and news from the Auxiliary on Facebook and the MHV website. Elsie Kathler Lunch time at the Waffle Booth! Earl Wiens (right), and Richard Kihn along with the Sawmill crew Elsie Kathler is one of many who can regularly are seen savouring their lunch of heart-shaped be found planting and pruning and watering the waffles smothered in Vanilla Sauce which were blooms—like the traditional geraniums which served by the Auxiliary one August Saturday. graced the windows of the Hochfeld House until Also for sale that day, we were able to offer now. Following a seasonal frost, she is pictured Parsley and Summer Savoury, Sauerkraut, pickles readying the last of the geraniums for their winter rest. www.mhv.ca OCTOBER 2020 3 PUTTING OUR COLLECTIONS TO WORK BY ANDREA KLASSEN, SENIOR CURATOR ...Continued from page 2 down my neighbourhood’s streets from the open through our exhibits, but during our pandemic to visit places and buildings in the village that were back of a hatch-back car, tooting the horn the whole closure, even as I worked on preparing the next meaningful; and Friday was all about #inspiration, way, on Easter Sunday morning. one, there was no guarantee we would be able to which featured an artefact with an inspiring story to At my desk that day in late March, open exhibits to the public this year. So I pivoted tell. I began to consider what I had to and made it my aim during our The goal of #museumathome was not only to offer to a world struggling to cope closure to bring the museum’s maintain a connection to our community of with an unprecedented situation. stories home to people by joining supporters while we could not welcome them at I have a unique and privileged the massive #museumathome the museum. My challenge with #museumathome job in caring for the museum’s social media campaign started by was to use our collection, arguably MHV’s most collection of 16,500+ artefacts museums around the world to unique resource, to reach out to others and make and two dozen heritage buildings bring their collections to the public a difference during a challenging time. The stories and monuments so I decided that during a time when the public was I chose to focus on were often uplifting but I did what I could offer was the unique unable to come to them.