CWM visit

[Ed Storey]

Bob, I agree that 90% of the people who visit a museum do not recognize any errors and for the most part enjoy their visit. But what you have forgotten is that there is a difference between museums and private collections. A private collector can do whatever they want with their stuff, if the lights are not correct or the colour shade is off the only person they have to satisfy is themselves.

Museums are different, there is perception that what is presented in a museum and what is on display in a museum is 100% correct, much like a text book. We all know that this is unachievable as we are all human and make errors, but this 100% is what a museum should strive for. To sit back and say that well 90% of the people who visit will not know the difference so therefore why worry is wrong. That attitude can apply to an amusement park but not an institution that is preserving national history.

To say that "Who amongst us can swear to the accuray of what is displayed about the Great War... over the years details get lost in the shuffle of time....." is a cop out. Yes, the details may well be lost, but that premise should not be used as an excuse not to research and search out the answers.

Stiving for improvement is the key, not sitting back and finding excuses to stick with the statis quo.

[Bruce MacMillan]

One factor that often gets ignored is the history of an item. Perhaps a vehicle had a "field modification" by a few men in a unit in 1945. Decades later someone says that wasn't the way they came from the factory and removes the mod effectively removing some of its provenance.

There are many instances of "never say never" so care should be taken when restoring an item.

I feel museums should conserve and educate. Keep an item in the original state and discover as much about it's history as possible. If a vehicle came right from the factory then, great, keep it that way. If it has bullet holes and Normandy sand then it's story should be told.

[Ed Storey]

Unfortunately, it seems that many museums treat vehicles like a doormat. Park it outside, let the kids climb on it, the birds nest in it, the weather deteriorate it and then slap on a new coat of paint to hold it all together. Fortunately this trend is starting to change in Canada, but at an agonizingly slow pace.

There also seems to be a hierarchy of artefacts with military vehicles being at the low end of the scale. Since military vehicles are big, dirty and heavy, the tendency is to park them outside and not really pay much attention to their preservation and provenance. The consequences of this are the loss of our automotive history and the vehicles that represented it.

If this trend is to be slowed down or stopped, now is the time to do it. There has been a thread on this forum discussing how the M113 series of vehicles is being disposed of and sold for scrap. The CF used over 1000 of these vehicles, and only a fraction of them are being upgraded for future use. With only a small percentage being saved by museums this means that in the very near future any Canadian used example of this vehicle type will be a rare commodity. It is a given that collectors will no longer be allowed to privately own many types of military vehicles but were the enthusiast/collector can still make a big difference is to assist/support/pressure those museums that do display vehicles to take a scholarly and planned approach to acquiring and preserving this equipment.

The chance to save the Cold War era Canadian M Series equipment may have passed, but that does not mean that all is lost. Some of the latest Afghanistan equipment may be released and this would be the time to not only save this material, but to make sure what is preserved is not parked outside to become the latest doormat.

[chris vickery]

Bruce, It was never my intent to suggest that items be made "factory fresh"... I appreciate as found or as used items as well.
What I have a problem with is when there are blatant errors in exibitions that have been pointed out and no attempt is or has been made to remedy them.
To "restore" as vehicle and display it as an "example" during a certain proposed time frame and then throw whatever colour paint or markings on it "just because it whats we had" is not an excuse, nor correct.
The movie industry does enough of this to us already. How many M37s do you see in the average WW2 movie???

[jason meade]

So Ed do you suggest that we the museums that dont have indoor storage should be over looked in favor of the two or three museums in all of canada that do....A statment like that is crasy...This is the reason there is very little of these old vechs around, Most museums and true historians would rather have a weathered looking APC, than a picture of one in a long lost book.
As I have mentioned in the past If you dont like seeing stuff rot away then support your museums by helping out and not making snide remarks about there collections on public forums,I have been working for 15 years keeping our vech collection going with lit5tle to no support and even less pay (Minum Wage) but we do it to keep people like you and the others in pictures so books can be wrote 50 years later and have something beside black and white photos scamed out of public archives.

[Ganmain Tony]

Healthy debate fellahs... Im impressed...

From a bloke who is out in the sticks in NSW Australia. Id just be grateful to see anything, anywhere, regardless of its condition, as long as its undercover.

Just a tin roof would do.

Well....you did ask for peoples opinions from other Commonwealth countries.

[Ed Storey]

Jason, please reread my comments. I did not point any fingers at any one institution nor did my comments attack any one person. If you have issues with authors and the publication of books, perhaps you may wish to start another thread on the topic.

Since you have opened the box, I will state that many of the military bases across Canada are peppered with vehicles on public outdoor display. Many of these vehicles are now rare examples of their type and allowing them to deteriorate does little to preserve our automotive heritage. Outdoor display was/is the norm as the final resting place for surplus military vehicles; as was the policy at one time of painting every Allied vehicle semi-gloss olive drab and every axis vehicle grey.

What I am saying is that all museum artifacts need to be treated as equals. For instance, no-one would ever take a painting and use it as a doormat to the museum yet for some reason many people seem to think that leaving a military vehicle outside to the elements is an acceptable practice. My point, which you seemed to have missed, is that I am suggesting that museums take a hard look at this practice and find another way to store and preserve this material.

Rather than crying and complaining about working hours and pay and pointing at other people, why not take the reigns and attempt to move the display practices of the museum that you work for in a different direction? This is already being done in some locations, CFB Shilo comes to mind, and perhaps people like yourself, who are working hard to preserve our history can also effect change in their museum.

By properly saving the vehicle artefacts we will have preserved our automotive history for succeeding generations of Canadians to enjoy, appreciate and study; including those evil authors who apparently publish books on vehicles....