The Miami Museum officially kicked off the season this past weekend with a fundraising effort for a new roof for a section of the historic building.
The project involves installing a metal roof on the former Anglican Church portion of the museum, which serves as its main entrance and office and houses the military and church-related exhibits.
The roof to be replaced was built over 110 years ago, so, like other parts of the original structure, it has been showing its age, said president Joe Brown.
“The roof had deteriorated, so we are putting a metal roof on it to make it more stable,” he said, estimating the cost to be about $12,500.
The museum has pursued a provincial grant, but much of the cost will need to be covered through fundraising.
Brown noted they have had some successful fundraising campaigns in recent years that raised in excess of $20,000. One was for the mosasaur fossil exhibit, including replacing the roof on the former Albert School portion of the museum that houses the fossil, and another one was to purchase new computer equipment to digitize the collection of over 2,500 artifacts, books and photographs.
“We’ve been successful in the past … we replaced the roof on the other part of the building, which was the old school,” he said. “It comes on heels of two other projects … so we’ve faced about $30,000 in capital costs in the last six years, but we’ve been successful in raising money.
“The museum’s been in place just over 50 years. We’ve had good ongoing support. We’ve been able to renew the exhibits, been able to maintain the buildings,” said Brown, who suggested the museum is very important not only to the local community but also the greater region.
“We’ve got a very good story here,” he said, noting the wide array of items ranging from pioneer, military, and Indigenous artifacts to prehistoric fossils.
“People are a bit taken aback when they come through,” Brown said. “They don’t realize how big it is, firstly—it’s about 2,500 square feet, which I think is bigger than your average home.
“It’s jam-packed. We’ve got about 2,500 artifacts here,” he said. “The history represented here is quite comprehensive, which I think is unusual for a museum like this here.”
The Miami Museum is a non-profit and will issue a tax donation receipt for all donations of $10 or more. For this campaign, they will add names to a new plaque recognizing bronze ($50), silver ($100), gold ($500), and platinum ($1,000) donors.
You can send donations to the Miami Museum at Box 153, Miami, Mb., R0G 1H0. For more information, you can call Brown at 204-435-2888, Jim Pankiw at 204-435-2370, or Nedra Burnett at 204-435-2191.
Standard Photos by Lorne Stelmach
