The Saskatoon Military Museum of Artifacts has seen a major uptick in numbers since COVID-19. Virtual tours at the facility in the Nutana Legion were initiated during the pandemic and it allowed the museum to be introduced to a dozen new schools. As a result, the Nutana Legion says school tours have increased by 300 per cent.
Historical interpreter and volunteer Kevin Hicks, a retired British soldier, says subsequently they now have a nucleus of volunteers which includes four students. This past week, two of their student volunteers, one dressed in the uniform of a World War II veteran and the other as a Piper, gave the tours to school students.
“At the end of it I watched these teenagers there, these 16-year-old teenagers, looking at the helmets and trying on the gear which is in our trying-on section and then taking photographs. Because trying to keep with the modern age we have a selfie section where you take a photograph in amongst the naval stuff that we’ve got there.”
Hicks says the museum is a very personal experience with the items, including letters and artifacts, donated by former Saskatchewan soldiers. Their volunteers are working on organizing the artifacts in the form of a timeline so visitors know exactly where they are going around the museum, chronologically.
Tickets are available at the Nutana Legion until Friday for a special evening giving an in-depth look at the Canadian commitment during World War II. Saturday night there will be a presentation by Kevin Hicks about the successful landing on D-Day and how the Canadian Army fought its way across Europe to eventually liberate Holland. A Netherland’s themed dinner starts at 6 p.m., the presentation is at 7 p.m. and there is a dance with live music to follow. D-Day was 79 years ago on June 6, 1944.
Kevin Hicks became aware of the depth of the Canadian involvement in World War II while exploring his own family history during the conflict. He says the fighting after Normandy went through the Falaise pocket, then they fought their way across through northern France, they fought their way across Belgium and then they arrive in Holland. He says, “The path to Holland, the road to Holland is paved with the sacrifice of the Canadian Army, and of course the British Army. Both are so close to my heart because of course my family heritage.”
