Tuesday, May 23, 2023: Today, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police mark their 150th year of service to Canada and Canadians. To honour this anniversary, CMMM artifacts currently on display highlight Cut Knife’s long-time connections to the RCMP and its predecessor, the North West Mounted Police. Lucille has selected items that have a direct connection to individuals who lived and worked in the Cut Knife community, which includes this beautiful jacket from the RCMP dress uniform, the Red Serge.
Red Serge jacket from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police dress uniform belonging to Shirley (Meriniuk) Yurchyshyn.
Items from the Walter Kingston collection: North West Mounted Police, Saskatchewan Provincial Police, and Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
These 2 photos show only a sampling of the RCMP artifacts on display at the Cut Knife Library for the next few weeks. Stop by and take a closer look at the items of clothing, memorabilia, framed paintings and photos, and the RCMP Musical Ride flag.
If you visited the Cut Knife Library yesterday, then I’m guessing you’ve already taken a look at the 3 new exhibits Lucille curated on Friday.
For everyone else, here’s a sneak peak of a selection of museum artifacts connected to past Coronations:
Coronation collectibles have been hot items for as long as there have been coronations.
Tin items such as the tray and lunch bucket were purchased as treasured memories of the special event. It is notable that when the lunch bucket was no longer in use for taking lunch to school, it was still not thrown out and remained as a coronation keepsake.
China items have been popular as shown here and in the other exhibit case.
Retailers were also able to profit from the event as seen by the tin box that had Oxo Cubes when sold in 1953.
L. Bullerwell, Clayton McLain Memorial Museum
View the tray, lunch bucket, china, and Oxo Cubes tin box at the Cut Knife Library.
In this display at the Cut Knife Library, view memorabilia from the Coronations of 1911, 1937, 1953, and 2023.
Elizabeth McLain was the wife of Clayton McLain; mother of Dale, Dennis, Sharon, Sylvia, Trevor; teacher at Gallivan School and Cut Knife High School; first Curator of the Clayton McLain Memorial Museum in Cut Knife. She was the recipient of the following awards:
CMMM Curator for 25 years
Cut Knife Citizen of the Year 1993
Museums of Saskatchewan Honourary Lifetime Achievement Award 2000
Canada Medal for Golden Anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II Reign
Coin was created in 2002 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II reign as queen of Canada. It was presented to individuals who made outstanding and exemplary contributions to their communities or Canada as a whole.
L. Bullerwell, Clayton McLain Memorial Museum
Elizabeth McLain was recognized for her volunteer work at the CMMM with a number of awards, which are on display in this exhibit, including the ‘Canada Medal for Golden Anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II Reign’.
This is a dream come true for Lucille and for many other longtime volunteers with the CMMM. The museum display cases located in the CK Library will provide a year-round public space in which we can showcase items from the many collections that spend most of their time in storage. All exhibits will be switched out as time permits. Stop in regularly to see what’s up next.
‘It’s the Small Things‘ consists of 11 artifacts taken out of storage and includes the following:
Handcrafted Box gifted at Christmas 1905 in Traverse City, Michigan (Donor: James Wettlaufer).
Nine items including a 1939 Royal Visit Commemorative Pin and Silver Spoon, a Pocket Watch, Tie Clip, and Hair Pin (Donor: Hazel Robertson).
Feather Hair Piece worn in the 1920s (Donor: Woodward Family).
To view the exhibit, and others on display, visit the Cut Knife Municipal Library at 113 Broad Street. Click here for Library hours.
It’s the Small Things exhibit located towards the rear of the Library in this display case on your left. (Items not shown in this photo.)
Clayton McLain Memorial Museum 