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The northern lights

'We come from the stars': How Indigenous peoples are taking back astronomy

Michel Labrecque

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Technology

For the past 14 years, Wilfred Buck, an Elder from the Opaskwayak Cree Nation and science facilitator with the Manitoba First Nations Education Resource Centre, has been teaching astronomy from an Indigenous perspective. 　 Buck has strong ties with Ingenium. In 2017, he and Annette S. Lee (Founder of Native Skywatchers) co-curated the exhibition, "One Sky, Many Astronomies" for the new Canada Science and Technology Museum. The exhibition features Mista Muskwa — a Bear Ininew constellation story

Collections & Connections

Stories from our collections, about the people we meet and the work we do at our three museums. Hosted by Collections and Research staff at Ingenium, find out about our diverse activities and projects, the exhibitions we work on, and the connections we make across Canada and around the world.

25 Stories

Panoramic photograph of delegates to the 1883 International Fisheries Exhibition in London. Below the image is a hand-drawn silhouette, used for identification purposes.

Anniversary of an excursion: Canadians at the 1883 London fisheries exhibition

Cariole collected by Marius Barbeau in 1936, Staint-Pascale-de Kamouraska (now Saint Pascal). Ingenium Museums, artifact No. 1967.0197.

Recovering the lost artifacts of ethnologist Marius Barbeau

You might not imagine that volunteer work at the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum would involve unravelling a mystery. But in truth, it can!

An infographic with four feature images of bicycles and other artifacts from the Shields collection.

Collection Development

Ingenium's big move: Packing Canada's largest bicycle collection

Camas Clowater-Eriksson

VIEW INFOGRAPHIC It’s no secret that Ingenium is gearing up for a big move. As staff busy themselves with this mammoth task, let us take a moment to fully appreciate just one of the MANY collections being packed up for the journey to the new Collections Conservation Center. Did you know that the Canada Science and Technology Museum holds the largest collection related to the history of bicycle technology in Canada? The Shields Collection contains over 3,000 items from the early nineteenth

Intern Charlotte Clemens, standing outside the museum in front of the museum sign.

Diving into museum work: The life of a summer intern

Charlotte Clemens

When I arrived in Ottawa about three months ago to work as an exhibition intern with the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. My short time with the museum turned out to be more interesting and colourful than I ever could have imagined; I’ve conducted damage reports, gone “undercover” for an in-house investigation, and even built an airplane out of a pool noodle! But before I delve into everything, let me tell you the real reason I’m here. This internship has

The inside of the metal carrier for the soil test kit, and the label affixed to the lid.

A colourful, family history shines behind a soil test kit

Behind a single artifact, there are many interwoven stories.

"Saint-Norbert Historique"

Social Science & Culture

Crossroads of Identity: French heritage and street naming in Saint-Norbert, Manitoba

Ayda Loewen-Clarke

Carleton University

In an urban environment, street names provide essential information: where am I? Where am I going? Where am I coming from? They orient us to our location, not only physically but also culturally, historically, and linguistically. As a result, street names can simultaneously reflect and create a community’s identity.

A black and white image of Gander Airport.

Stepping inside an artifact: A visit to Gander International Airport

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Technology

Find out what this is !

Collection Development

A peek inside the mind of a collector

Michel Labrecque

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Technology

A biochemist, avid cross-country skier, and former science budget analyst speaks on the joys of collecting, the lessons learned, and the importance of preserving material culture.

Cristina Wood and Tom Everrett examine records of tailwater elevations from the Domtar/E.B. Eddy/J.R. Booth Collection, which provided some of the historical data sets used in the “Songs of the Ottawa” project.

Social Science & Culture

Songs of the Ottawa: Using sound to interpret historical data

Tom Everrett, PhD

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Technology

Data visualization techniques are commonly used by researchers to interpret and share data. If you’ve ever encountered a bar graph, pie chart, or infographic, then you’ve already observed one of the many ways that researchers use visual imagery to render complex data sets more approachable and easier to understand. But what if instead of visuals , researchers instead used sounds to communicate information about their research data? This is one of the guiding questions that motivated Carleton

A mother and daughter weaving a carpet.

Unseen and unrecognized: Women’s key role in the history of computer memories

Ghazaleh Jerban

Guest writer, Ingenium-University of Ottawa Fellowship in Gender, Science and Technology.

In 2017, I had the honour of travelling to Iran — the country that's world famous for its hand-woven carpets — to study women’s traditional practises of Persian carpet weaving. I visited collective and home carpet-weaving workshops in Kashan , where I interviewed local women who were involved in carpet weaving. Frames of astonishing designs, mixed with attractive colours using traditional tools, have been fixed in my memory. Traditional tools used for carpet weaving, ToranjMehrab carpet weaving

The unloading of the nitroglycerin carried from Shelby, Montana, to Calgary, Alberta, aboard the (purple?) Stinson SB-1 Detroiter operated by Great Western Airways Limited, February 1929. Anon., “–.” Canadian Aviation, April 1929, 17.

Unsafe at any speed or time

Rénald Fortier

Is that an expression of shock or disbelief I see on your face, my reading friend? Shock would be an appropriate reaction. Disbelief, not so much. What follows is no joke, my reading friend, but I beseech you not to try this at home. This week’s story comes to you courtesy of the most successful aviation magazine in Canadian history, personal opinion, the monthly Canadian Aviation , more specifically its April 1929 issue. Once upon a time, early in 1929 to be exact, Calmont Oils Limited, a

microdensitometer

A space-age microscope for reading the stars

David Pantalony, PhD

Ingenium: Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Each object we move to the new Collections Conservation Centre comes with many stories, connections, and interpretations. As a curator for physical sciences and medicine, I have the privilege of examining incredibly diverse objects in the national science and technology collection. This microdensitometer stands out for a number of reasons; first, it has an illustrious connection to Canadian and international astronomy. The microdensitometer featured here came to Ingenium from the David Dunlap

An artist’s rendering of the Ingenium Collections Conservation Centre, currently under construction next to the Canada Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa.

Engineering & Technology

Not your average warehouse: Ingenium’s new Collections Conservation Centre

Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation

Ingenium’s new Collections Conservation Centre will open in only a few months. This is a dream come true for those of us who have been caring for Canada’s national collection of scientific and technological artifacts for our entire careers, and have been waiting for this moment for over a decade.

An oil painting depicts a hotel dwarfed by the mountains of Banff.

Social Science & Culture

Why we collect

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

As Ingenium prepares to move the national science and technology collection into the new Collections Conservation Centre over the coming months, curator Sharon Babaian reflects on the purpose of collecting. As curators, we collect objects to document, preserve, and understand the past. The things made and used by people are physical evidence of human invention, activity, and need; they also reflect the societies, communities, and cultures that created and adopted them. At Ingenium – Canada’s

A black-and-white image of a plane in flight.

The death of a dream: The sixtieth anniversary of Avro’s Black Friday

Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Technology

Today marks the sixtieth anniversary of the cancellation of the CF-105 Avro Arrow, Canada’s first and only supersonic fighter interceptor. It remains one of the most contentious moments in Canadian aerospace history.

Two men stand in a dirt field; one bores into the soil while the other looks on.

Excavating Canadian soil science history

Guest Writer, Queen's University

In honour of World Soil Day, this blog post reports on a collaborative research project that explores the history of soil science in Canada. Launched in June 2018, the project documents the history of Canadian soil scientists and their research programs, as well as their documentary and artefactual heritage. This project was generously funded by the Canadian Soil Information Service at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

Making sense of an Enigma

Molly McCullough

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Students at Maupeltuewey Kina'matno'kuom, an elementary school (primary to 8) located in Membertou.

Visit to Membertou, Cape Breton

David Pantalony, PhD

Ingenium: Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

6” Cooke & Sons refracting telescope

Social Science & Culture

Award profile: Putting a historic telescope back into focus

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Through the course of a project spanning nine years, two Ingenium conservators — Tony Missio and David Elliott — had the chance to work on the complete restoration and preservation of the 6” Cooke & Sons refracting telescope, bought by the Meteorological Service of Canada in 1882. The telescope was in service for over 100 years; it was donated to the museum by its last owner, the University of Toronto, in 1984. The telescope was dismantled and brought to the national collection storage. On

The Petrovic Collection

Social Science & Culture

Award profile: Finding cultural connections through our shared mathematical heritage

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

The Petrovic Collection at the Canada Science and Technology Museum is a collection of over 130 mathematical instruments from the twelfth to nineteenth centuries. These instruments came to the museum in 1980 from Dr. George Petrovic, a Serbian-born architect who collected them in order to document the connections between mathematical practice and architecture in the eastern Mediterranean regions, as well as countries that were once part of the Ottoman Empire. The collection is now at the centre

Seventy-six women from around the world were participants on the inaugural Homeward Bound Women In Science Leadership Expedition to Antarctica.

Social Science & Culture

Homeward Bound: Women in Science and Leadership in Antarctica

Dr. Shelley Ball

Guest Writer, Biosphere Environmental Education

What better place to sharpen one’s leadership skills than amidst the harsh landscape of Antarctica. The frozen continent is filled with stories of leadership from the early 20th century explorers and their race to be the first to set foot on the South Pole. For 76 of us from around the world - all women with science backgrounds - Antarctica was the backdrop for our own explorations into leadership.

Alexa, a Canadienne dairy cattle calf, laying down in the calf barn at the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum.

Alexa: 400 Years of History, and an Uncertain Future

Cédric Brosseau

Ingenium Canada

A short post on the history and current status of the Canadienne dairy cattle breed.

A selection of apiculture journals in the Rare Books Collection at Canada Science and Technology Museum.

Apiarist Ambitions: Subscription Incentives in the Canadian Bee Journal

Guest writer, McGill University

When the going gets tough, I get this vision: I’ll pick up my life, buy a plot of land in the countryside, and take up apiculture. That’s right: beekeeping.

Envelope sent to John Horn from Samuel Morse in 1871. It appears between pages 470-71 in Horn’s volume of The Telegraph in America.

Social Science & Culture

Enhanced Reading: John Horn’s Volume of The Telegraph in America, 1879

Guest writer, McGill University

Books are tools that organize knowledge. When readers access that knowledge, they engage a reading experience.

Joust for Atari (artifact no. 2002.0384.001)

Sports & Gaming

Rising from the Grave: “Deadplay" and Video Game Preservation

Dany Guay-Bélanger

Guest writer, Carleton University

Videogames are cultural heritage artifacts worthy of preservation. My Master’s major research project culminated in the creation of a podcast and website which investigates videogame preservation and proposes some solutions to this complex and pressing issue.

Trudy Metcalfe displays a number of cultural pieces as she discusses Inuit life.

Behind the scenes: Meet an Inuit chef

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Trudy Metcalfe is a rare commodity; she’s the only Inuit chef in southern Canada. Far from her hometown of Nain — an Inuit community off the coast of Labrador — Metcalfe offers up a taste of her culture at various events in the Ottawa area, which she now calls home. The Ingenium Channel recently caught up with Metcalfe, just as she was preparing to serve conference delegates from around the world at the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum.

Canoes hover around a beach shore in Bella Bella, British Columbia during the Qatuwas in 2014

An Indigenous canoe video series marks a new wave of cultural revitalization

Through a new online video series, Frank Brown is highlighting how Indigenous youth are reconnecting with the traditional, ocean-going canoe. Brown is the executive producer of Glwa – the ocean-going canoe , a series of 13 short videos that showcase the widespread impact of the canoe and the revival of its practice with maritime Indigenous culture today.

Students at Maupeltuewey Kina'matno'kuom, an elementary school (primary to 8) located in Membertou.

Visit to Membertou, Cape Breton

David Pantalony, PhD

Ingenium: Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Hudson Strait Expedition Personnel of Base "C" - October 1927

The Hudson Strait Expedition: Looking beyond the prism of provenance

In honour of Archives Awareness Week (April 2-8), Ingenium is highlighting a few gems taken from our digital collection. In archives and museums, history is often told through the prism of provenance. This could mean that the history of the artifact is told from the point of view of the manufacturer that made the object, or by the company that used the object. Similarly in archives, we most often present records from the point of view of their creator or the last person to use them before they

Screen capture of the Digital Archives welcome page.

Ingenium’s Digital Archives opens museum vaults to the curious

Researchers, creators, and digital citizens rejoice – the vaults have been opened! Thanks to a new Digital Archives portal from Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation, Canadians now have unprecedented access to the archives of three national museums. This means a whole new level of access to digital copies of holdings – and a look at naked catalogue records – from the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum, the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, and the Canada Science and Technology

Telescope brings Western and Indigenous astronomy into focus

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

Two streams of astronomical thought and practice are represented in a stunning display at the Canada Science and Technology Museum – but visitors will need to act fast in order to see it. A telescope made by Eustachio Divini – an extremely fragile and valuable artifact which dates back to 1665 – is on international loan for the next six months, after travelling all the way from the Museo Galileo in Florence, Italy to Ottawa. The unexpected backdrop to this ornamented artifact – which is regally

The Kuujjuaq Christmas Candy Drop

Labrador classrooms receive books about an inspirational pilot

Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation

More than 30 Inuit classrooms in Labrador will receive a special delivery from Ottawa this month. Each classroom will receive a copy of the children’s book, The Kuujjuaq Christmas Candy Drop , written by Linda Brand, on behalf of the Canada Aviation and Space Museum. “The book centres around legendary Inuk bush pilot Johnny May, and his unique way of sharing the holiday spirit,” explains Brand, interpretation officer for community programs at the museum. “This pilot is a wonderful role model –