The role of window and door screens in keeping out disease was the message of an early public health display and the messenger was a single animated fly.
In the 1920s, the Saskatchewan Bureau of Public Health used a fly on a wire to show people how easily disease can spread from barn to yard to home.
The original mechanized display, immensely popular at community fairs across the province, is long gone but Western Development Museum volunteers in Saskatoon have created an exact replica, named From Cow Pie to Apple Pie.
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Joan Champ, WDM production co-ordinator, said the assortment of miniature buildings, furnishings, livestock and people will become part of the Western Development Museum’s Winning the Prairie Gamble exhibit in late May.
In the new exhibit, a fly slowly travels along a track of chain and sprockets powered by a motor. It moves between a manure pile, barn, tuberculosis patient’s home, outhouse and school, before finally settling on an apple pie cooling on the windowsill.
“People didn’t understand how they got sick,” said Champ about the original
exhibit. “This was a way to alert people to the dangers of houseflies.”
The health department used these models to educate and to entertain, she said.
“The more mechanical, the more fun. The more entertaining they were, the greater the chance of getting their message across.”
During the 1920s, the provincial government targeted summer fairs to present exhibits promoting improvements in the quality of agricultural and home life.
The displays originally toured fairs in Saskatoon and Regina, but later included many exhibitions in smaller cities.
After deciding to recreate these special displays, the WDM turned to its extensive network of volunteers.
Tucked away in the museum’s upper level workshop, seniors Delvyn Huyghebaert, Gary Holroyd and Vic Cookman sand and saw the tiny roofs and walls that will become the display.
Ducking under pipes and squeezed into a room of scrap materials and woodworking tools, they explain how much they enjoy their role in preserving prairie history. They all grew up on farms and spent their working lives with Pioneer Grain and now volunteer their time on various building and restoration projects at the museum.
“Once you’re retired, you’ve got to do something,” said Holroyd.
“We’re used to all working and still like to do it,” added Cookman.
As many as 75 volunteers meet at the museum for coffee, fellowship and a little hard work each week.
Their support allows the museum to complete a number of projects, said Champ.
“It’s part of the tradition of the museum,” said Champ, who noted how the early WDM was run by volunteer efforts.
Volunteering is a family tradition for Huyghebaert, whose rural upbringing included helping out in his community alongside his parents.
Over the years, the three men have been involved in various projects from restoring the Christmas story exhibit to erecting a
T. Eaton house on site.
Huyghebaert enjoys seeing the look on children’s faces as they experience a part of Saskatchewan’s history, whether it be a dog-powered water pump, a milking cow or a treadmill used in threshing.
The fly model is just one item headed to the new 1920s age of prosperity exhibit at the museum. Visitors will follow a family as it moves through a summertime fairground and takes in commercial exhibits, kitchen innovations, machinery row and a fun house.
The remainder of the Winning the Prairie Gamble exhibit which now includes a sod house, is expected to be completed by 2008.
