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January 7, 2005
Museum opens in 2005
Jewish history in B.C. focus of coming attraction.
PAT JOHNSON
By this time next year, you should be able to visit the British
Columbia museum of Jewish history in the Jewish Community Centre
of Greater Vancouver. The long-talked-about museum is about to become
a reality, according to organizers who launched a final fund-raising
push Jan. 1.
The museum is a project of the Jewish Historical Society of British
Columbia (JHS). Bill Gruenthal, the society's president, said the
hopes for a museum of B.C. Jewish history took several major steps
forward recently and plans are firm enough that they can say they
expect the as-yet-unnamed museum to be open and operating by late
2005. What it will look like, what the exhibits will consist of
and the specific target audiences remain topics of consideration,
but Gruenthal has no doubt that the overall project is a go.
"There are an awful lot of unknowns in this thing as we speak,"
he said. "The one known fact is there will be a museum."
The JHS is working closely with the Jewish Genealogical Institute
of B.C. to combine their archival resources for the benefit of wider
audiences. The genealogical society has collections of family history,
while the historical society has significant and eclectic collections
of Jewish-related materials including artifacts, photographs, recorded
memoirs and memorabilia. At present, the historical society's archival
holdings are almost all in storage, with limited access to researchers
and other interested parties. Gruenthal hopes a museum will allow
his society's riches to be shared more publicly.
Beyond that, the museum's potential is still being explored. The
exhibits visitors will see remain to be determined by the steering
committee and the eventual board that will govern the museum. Focus
groups are being organized for the coming weeks to determine what
potential visitors would most like to see. The canvass is almost
blank, said Gruenthal. It is to be a museum reflecting Jewish history
in the province, but the parameters can be as narrow or as broad
as organizers and the public would like, ranging from exhibits of
explicitly local interest to, say, exhibits of ancient or more recent
historical artifacts that just happen to be in British Columbia.
A range of permanent and changing exhibits seems probable, and special
sections – a children's museum, for example – are being
discussed.
"We want the museum to reflect, generally, Jewish history in
British Columbia but it can go beyond," Gruenthal said, adding
one caveat: "It will not encroach in any way, shape or form
on the Holocaust." That work is being ably done by the Vancouver
Holocaust Education Centre and will not be duplicated by the new
museum, he said. What Gruenthal hopes, however, is that individuals
and groups who come to the JCC to visit the Holocaust centre will
make the trip upstairs as well, to see the offerings at the Jewish
museum.
Gruenthal credits a steering committee made up of some of British
Columbia's most noted museum experts, architects, designers, fund-raisers
and historians who have come together in common cause to see the
museum to fruition. Gary Averbach, a past-president of the Jewish
Community Centre, is one of Gruenthal's closest allies on the project,
as is Rabbi Yosef Wosk, whose personal knowledge of the province's
Jewish community and Jewish history more generally, are being used
by the museum's planners. Catherine Youngren, president of the Jewish
Genealogical Society, is the chair of the museum's steering committee.
She is also an interior designer, whose professional expertise will
be put to use as the museum's physical structure and appearance
is deliberated. The museum will be a special delight for Cyril Leonoff,
an author who is the British Columbia Jewish community's unofficial
historian and who founded the Jewish Historical Society in 1972.
He envisioned a museum many years ago.
Ronnie Tessler, the first executive director of the Vancouver Holocaust
Education Centre, is also on the steering committee, and said she
imagines the exhibits in the museum will mostly be temporary ones,
created in-house and focusing on aspects of local history. A significant
gift of Judaica is expected once the museum is near opening, she
added. But, like other organizers, Tessler was hesitant to prejudge
future curatorial choices. Jewish history in this province began
in 1858, she said, when the first Jews arrived in conjunction with
the successive gold rushes, and the new museum could therefore be
expected to include anything after that date up to contemporary
times.
"It could be anything," she added, suggesting that partnerships
with outside groups like synagogues or community agencies might
allow their stories to be told through museum exhibits. Individual
life stories, if they were exemplary of larger historical trends,
might be employed to tell the story of B.C. Jewish life, she added.
With a wealth of resources and a cast of strong proponents, the
immediate challenge for the nascent museum was finding appropriate
space to locate the facility. In what seemed like a wish come true,
Gruenthal said, the JHS discovered that a 3,000-square-foot space
was opening up in the JCC. (The Jewish Family Service Agency is
finalizing plans for a move early this year.) The historical society
put dibs on the space and received verbal agreement to take it over
early this year, paperwork pending. With the space all but assured,
the museum steering committee began a fund-raising effort on Jan.
1 that they hope will reach their $1.25 million goal by June 30.
With design and technical work expected to take six to nine months,
Gruenthal said they hope the museum will be open to the public by
the end of this year. While not underestimating the challenge of
raising that amount of money, Gruenthal added that he has every
confidence the funds will be forthcoming.
"We've made a tremendous start in financial commitments,"
he said. Several substantial donations have been committed and many
smaller amounts have been rolling in, according to Gruenthal. "We're
pretty sure that in six months we will raise sufficient funds to
build and organize this thing for five years, including operating
expenses. We will need ongoing income, but [funds are] not going
to be a huge concern once it's built."
The museum will exist under the auspices of the historical society,
though Gruenthal said it is a personal objective of his to ensure
that the museum project, as public and important as it is, does
not eclipse the broader mandate of the JHS.
Though the museum has been talked about in historical and genealogical
circles for some time, the imminent success of the plan is news
to many in the community and Gruenthal can't hide his excitement
that forces seem to be coming together to create a museum in 2005.
"I'm absolutely tickled pink," he said.
Pat Johnson is a B.C. journalist and commentator.
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