Peterborough Museum & Archives facts for kids

Peterborough Museum & Archives

Established	1897 (Current Location: since 1967)
Location	300 Hunter Street East Peterborough, Ontario K9J 6Y5
Visitors	~32,000 per year

The Peterborough Museum & Archives is a cool historical museum in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. It used to be called the Peterborough Centennial Museum and Archives (PCMA). This museum is very old, with a history going back over 100 years! It has the second oldest historical collection of its kind in Ontario.

The museum is close to the famous Trent-Severn Waterway National Historic Site of the Peterborough Lift Lock. Inside, you'll find over 33,000 amazing artifacts and tons of historical documents. Because there's so much to see, only about 3% of the collection can be shown at one time!

History of the Museum

The front entrance of the Peterborough Museum & Archives.

The Museum's Location

The museum sits on a special hill called Armour Hill. This hill is a drumlin, which is a small, oval-shaped hill made by glaciers long ago. From here, you get an awesome view of the area around Peterborough!

The building itself was designed by a famous architect named Eberhard Zeidler. His company started designing it in 1965.

Not far from the main museum, there's also a special building called the Heritage Pavilion. This building is made from 150-year-old white pine wood. It used to be a church in downtown Peterborough back in the 1840s!

The Heritage Pavilion, a historic building on the museum grounds.

The land where the museum is located was given to the City of Peterborough. It's known as Ashburnham Memorial Park. There's a plaque on the hill that says the park was given by a group of women. They wanted to remember the men from Peterborough who bravely fought in World War I (1914–1918).

A plaque at Ashburnham Memorial Park, remembering soldiers.

How the Museum Started

Peterborough's very first museum opened on October 31, 1898. It was called the Victoria Museum, named after Queen Victoria. This first museum was near Inverlea Park.

Later, in April 1912, the collection moved to a new library on George Street. This building is now part of the Peterborough City Hall. As the collection grew, it needed a bigger, permanent home.

The current museum building officially opened to the public on October 28, 1967. It was a special project to celebrate Canada's 100th birthday (Centennial)! Much of the original Victoria Museum collection is still here. The museum also added its important collection of historical documents, called the Archives, in the mid-1970s.

Over the years, the museum's collection has grown a lot. In 2004, Peterborough had some major flooding. The museum worked hard to protect its items and continues to restore anything that was damaged. The museum hopes to expand in the future to show even more of its amazing collection!

How the Museum Works

The Peterborough Museum & Archives is managed by the City of Peterborough. It's part of the city's Culture & Heritage Division. The museum gets help from many people, families, groups, and businesses who donate items and support its work.

The museum works with other important groups like the Canadian Museums Association (CMA). It's also connected to the Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN) and the Virtual Museum of Canada. These connections help the museum share its history with more people.

The museum also helps students learn about how museums are managed. It works with local colleges and universities, like Fleming College and Trent University, to teach future museum experts.

The Archives Collection

The museum's archives are like a treasure chest of old documents! They let people look at historical papers and records about Peterborough and the areas nearby.

These documents include things like:

• Architectural drawings and blueprints
• Old business records
• Diaries and letters
• Maps and paintings
• Old photographs and videos

If you want to visit the Archives, you usually need to make an appointment. This helps the museum protect these special items.

Some of the amazing items in the Archives include:

• Catharine Parr Traill
  • A special album of pressed flowers made by this famous pioneer writer and botanist.
• The Original Peter Robinson Papers
  • These papers tell the story of Irish settlers who came to Ontario, Canada, in 1823.
• The Balsillie Collection of Roy Studio Images
  • This huge collection has over 300,000 old photos! They are on film and glass plates and date all the way back to 1896.

What You Can See

The Peterborough Museum & Archives focuses on the history of Peterborough and its surrounding areas. But it also has a wide variety of artifacts from many different areas of interest.

Here are some of the types of collections you can explore:

• Archaeology (studying ancient cultures)
• Ethnography (studying human cultures)
• Furniture
• Military Collections
• Natural History (plants, animals, geology)
• Recreational items (like old toys, dolls, and sports equipment)
• Technology
• Textiles (fabrics and clothing)

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