On Sept. 20, 2019, a freak storm hit Red Lake. Hurricane level winds ripped the roof off the Red Lake Regional Heritage Centre.
Three staff members were in the building at the time and took cover under their desks until emergency workers were able to safely extract them. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
“I grew up in the Barrie area, so ever since school we’d had tornado drills; so, I was scared but my instinct was to get everyone under their desks,” curator Lisa Hughes said. “Now every time the roof rattles, I have to take a moment.”
The roof was made up of an outer weather sealed shell, a layer of insulation and an interior roof. Only the interior, non-weather-proof layer remained.
“Someone from the hospital had actually walked over after to tell us that the roof had come off,” Hughes said.
The Municipality of Red Lake’s recreation and facilities department, with the additional help of the Red Lake Miners hockey team, responded to the situation immediately. They covered the exhibits and artifacts to protect them from water damage, then began covering the desks, shelving, and other assets. Their quick reaction time and willingness to work under hazardous conditions had a huge impact on the survival of the heritage centre.
Approximately a week later, workers from Service Master put tarps on the roof to minimize water coming in, and set up industrial fans and dehumidifiers in an effort to keep the building as dry as possible.
“Thanks to the community, we always had volunteers and we were able to get practically everything out safely,” said heritage centre director Trevor Osmond.
Unfortunately, in the days following, Red Lake experienced very heavy rains, and water continued to pour in and cause damage. The ongoing rain made getting the museum’s collection to a safe place an urgent matter. The heritage centre staff developed an emergency response plan with advice from the artifact protection specialists at the Canadian Conservation Institute.
They secured a dry, heated storage warehouse in Balmertown, where the artifacts could be safely stored. Over the following weeks, the artifacts and exhibits were boxed up and loaded onto pallets, which were then moved by forklift and truck to storage. Nearly 6,000 artifacts were moved from Red Lake to Balmertown. Work then began on repairing the building.
The construction of the new roof started in November 2019 and was completed in January 2020. Over the course of the next two years, First Response, a restoration company, worked to remove any materials that had been damaged by water, developed mould or that had been broken. First Response cleaned and treated the building with an antifungal agent. They put up new drywall, installed new flooring and with the help of local electricians at Viking Electric, tested and restored power to the building.
In the interim, staff had relocated to an office in the Balmertown warehouse. There, they unpacked every box, analyzed every artifact for damage, and then catalogued and repacked them for safe storage.
“It just gave us a chance to focus on the collection, it gave us a chance to unpack and properly work on all the artifacts. As terrible as it all was, some good came of the situation,” Hughes said.
While most staff were working hard on looking after the artifacts, the director was working with the Municipality of Red Lake and the insurance company to develop a plan for dealing with losses that occurred during the storm. Additionally, a great deal of fundraising and grant writing helped prepare the heritage centre for its eventual return to the building.
In 2021, the last planning and repairs were completed by First Response. In February the heritage centre staff were able to start moving artifacts back into the building. A new artifact storage room, funded by the Canada Cultural Spaces Fund, was built into the basement to properly store artifacts. The heritage centre was also successful in obtaining the Museum Association Program’s Digital Access Grant, and local funding to update its temporary gallery space with an art hanging system. Over the next few months of that year, the staff worked to set up the furniture, shelving, and unpacking artifacts.
“The RLRHC relied heavily on volunteers to help make repairs on old shelving, paint storage spaces and move artifacts, files and gift shop items,” Osmond said.
The COVID-19 pandemic greatly affected the heritage centre's ability to stay open in 2020 and 2021. However, in 2021, the building was open in a limited scope.
“Visitors were able to finally come into the museum and enjoy an art exhibit, check out the Nature Trading program, look at local tourism opportunities and experience the RLRHC all be it through a COVID-19 lens,” Osmond said.
The heritage centre was able to be a part of the planning process for the ‘Red Lake – Strong Together Festival’ to celebrate the end of fire season. The temporary gallery was finished and reopened in October. Its first exhibit was Ezhi Namang: How We See It, which was showcased art pieces from the Red Lake Indian Friendship Centre. A total of 39 pieces were on display, with many of the pieces never having been displayed before.
In 2022, the heritage centre was successful in attaining a grant through the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation, which was used to construct a new road sign out front and fabricate a replacement for the main hallway exhibit Dr. Aiken: Red Lake’s First Dentist. Additional aspects of the project included replacing or refurbishing main gallery exhibits such as Hell’s Acres: The Grandma Gene Experience, Anishinaabe: The People of the Land, Airborne: Red Lake’s Aviation History, and An Introduction to Red Lake. The grant also helped repair the main gallery exhibits, Beneath it All: Red Lake’s Mining History, and One Way Ticket: Red Lake’s Immigration Story.
The main gallery exhibit room space promises to stay true to its legacy and its mandate by showcasing the history of Red Lake, however, there has been a move towards more interactive displays over the past five years. This is something that has carried on throughout the new designs. Visitors will find themselves immersed in a cornucopia of new exhibits as well as old favourites.
“We felt it was necessary to create new experiences while holding on to what made the RLRHC special in the first place” Osmond said..
The original goal was to have the project completed by the end of 2022, and be open in January, however, because of delays in availability and shipping, the opening day has moved back to February.
“We hope the opening will coincide with Red Lake’s Winter Carnival,” Osmond said.
