Posterous theme by Cory Watilo

Not old enough to be heritage. Connecting with our past.

I'm working on a project called Home from the War - Stories from St.Catharines' Wartime Neighbourhoods.  It started out as a one time celebration to mark the 65th anniversary of the end of Word War II.  It has grown to include: a photo exhibit, the planting of a garden, a website, the installation of a plaque and the possible greening of wartime house.  The most exciting and interesting addition has been the gathering of stories from families that lived in these houses and in some cases still do.  

Most reactions to the project have been very positive and in some cases down right excited, but recently I've run across a few who question whether these houses are really heritage. I wasn't so much shocked by their view, but stumped by it.  How can buildings that are 65 years old, not be old enough?  How old does a building have to be for them to consider it heritage?

Until these people said that they didn't think Wartime Houses were old enough, I hadn't had to explain or justify why a Heritage Committee would consider these buildings heritage. I have to say, it's caused me to really think about it and this afternoon when I read a "Saved for the Nation: Monuments to Britain's Cold War" from The Guardian, the answer came to me.  The CEO of English Heritage, Simon Thurley said about these cold war buildings,"To anyone over 50, the cold war is too recent to feel like history, but to 17-year-olds it is just as historic as Napoleon." 

To many in the heritage world older is better. What we in the heritage world sometime forget is that history and heritage are relative to today's date. To someone who's 90, the 65 year old house that they live in isn't that old, but if you ask an 18 year old about the recording of "We Are the World" in 1985, that was a long time ago.

As I thought about it further, I thought about how hard it is to get people excited or interested in heritage. Many of the events and buildings that we celebrate or preserve are over 100 years old and for a majority of people, they don't see or feel a connection to them.  Wartime Houses offer a connection to our past to many who lived it, their children and grandchildren.  That's a connection. 

One of the families that has so generously offered their time, memories and photos to our project is the McArthurs.  They lived next door to my Nana and I contacted them because I had been given a copy of a book of their father's poems that he wrote during and after the war.  I thought it was a great story and example of a family that lived in a wartime house.  What I didn't expect was how this recent past connect us to our distant past.  The McArthur family is directly connected to the building of the Fourth Welland Canal, the First World War and the immigration of so many during the early 1900's. 

I think if I'm asked again about whether Wartime Houses are old enough, I will answer, that by connecting people to the recent past, it makes it possible to connect them to the distant past.  By understanding the changes in our city and country in the last 65 years, it opens the door to understanding what happened 100 years ago.  So are these houses old enough?  You bet.