‘Protecting the past,’ Northern Life Museum celebrates 50 years

From taxidermy fowl and mammals to traditional clothing and even a Samurai’s suit of armour, a museum in Fort Smith has been documenting the history of the North for five decades.

The Northern Life Museum and Cultural Centre celebrated its 50th anniversary earlier this month.

Its roots began in 1952 when Father Francis Ebner, known as the “motorcycle missionary” of the NWT, was worried that historically important items were being lost. Many people began donating items and the first collection went on display in Yellowknife before being moved to other locations in the territory.

Several Fort Smith residents later founded the Northern Anthropological and Cultural Society in 1972. The collection begun by Ebner, which had then grown to 10,000 items, was placed in the newly constructed Fort Smith museum two years later.

Ivy-Lory Conroy, the current manager of the museum and cultural centre, said it now has a collection of more than 17,000 artifacts.

“It’s incredibly important for protecting the past and giving the past a future,” she said. “Basically a lot of the artifacts would be lost to time or taken away out of the Northwest Territories by passers through.”

Curator Cassandra Colman said among the special pieces on display is Canus, a whooping crane discovered in Wood Buffalo National Park as an injured chick in 1964. Today, the taxidermy bird is still missing a wing, which is how Colman said “you really know it’s Canus.”

In the mid-1960s, there were only around 40 whooping cranes estimated to be living in the wild. Canus became one of the first and longest contributors to the captive breeding program and had 186 descendants by 2003.

According to the US Fish and Wildlife Surveys, a January 2023 aerial survey of the Aransas-Wood Buffalo whooping crane population indicated there were 536 birds.

“A lot of the birds, not just in the park but in the world today, are his children and grandchildren,” Colman said. “So he’s pretty special. I like to call him our local celebirdy.”

The museum’s collection also includes the Radium King, a large boat on display outdoors, which Colman said was used to ship radium and uranium to the United States, where it was used in the Manhattan Project.

She also highlighted the cultural centre’s teepee, working smokehouse, cold and dry caches, and berry patch.

Colman, who has worked as the museum’s curator since March 2021, said she will be leaving Fort Smith to go back to school in the fall.

“It’s been a pleasure working in Fort Smith. I’ve learned a lot and there’s a lot I’m going to miss,” she said. “I’m grateful for the opportunity to have been here.”

Beyond displaying artifacts and offering backroom tours, the museum also hosts events, workshops and art shows.

Recently, it featured an art exhibit titled Ultria, with photographs and watercolour paintings that local artist Alex James, or AJ, completed while hiking the Camino de Santiago Trail in the fall of 2023.

Conroy, who has been the director of the museum for about a year, said one of the most memorable events during her tenure so far was when the community was evacuated due to wildfires.

“That was a crazy moment, a big snapshot in time here and we pulled through really well,” she said.

“We had to cover all of our artifacts and the Treaty 8 had to be taken out of the museum very quickly. It was protected and kept with our chairman of the board throughout the entire evacuation.”

Conroy said the independent non-profit museum now hopes to find funding to offer more workshops. She added the museum will partner with the Fireweed Festival in August and is planning a fashion show in September.

“It’s mesmerizing to see all the work being put into it behind the scenes,” she said.

“Putting these things on, it takes a lot of work, a lot of time, a lot of planning, and I’m just incredibly proud of our staff and I feel honoured to be here.”