As this summer marks the 150th anniversary of British Columbia joining Canadian Confederation, I contemplate centennials gone by and reflect on the role of commemoration in BC’s past and present.
In 2008, I worked at the BC Forest Discovery Centre in Duncan and curated an exhibit about Thelma Godkin, who worked as a whistle punk for a Vancouver Island logging operation in the 1940s. The exhibit was one of dozens created across the province to mark the 150th anniversary of the founding of the crown colony of BC by highlighting the historical contributions of women.
The Nanaimo Museum—established as a 1967 centennial museum and where I have worked since 2011—developed the “Canada 150: Centennial Stories” exhibit in 2017, which featured a selection of artifacts to help visitors decipher the dizzying number of centennials from 1958–1974. Memorable artifacts from six centennials included souvenir boxes of the World’s Biggest
