The historic Penhold drop curtain has left town to go to its permanent home in Ottawa at the Canadian War Museum where its critically important heritage value will be shared with Canadians.
On Sunday (May 8), town officials and a sprinkling of locals, held a short farewell ceremony for the rare First World War artifact, described as a “national treasure”. The curtain was packed up yesterday and transported to the nation's capital.
Stewart Ford, the retired local businessman responsible for the curtain's restoration, said he was a “little sad” to see the nationally important artifact leave the community.
“I do feel good about it because we now have it as a national treasure status and it will be beautifully protected in the Canadian War Museum,” said Ford. “We still have a couple of years left to honour the First World War and hopefully the curtain will be displayed in the east.”
The drop curtain, which measures 6.3 metres by 3.7 metres, has being hanging in the lobby of the Penhold Regional Multiplex since Nov. 5, when the town and Ford hosted an unveiling gala. The event was attended by Alberta Lt.-Gov. Lois Mitchell, retired Major-General Lewis MacKenzie, Mark O'Neill, president of the Canadian War Museum and many other dignitaries.
“This (curtain) is definitely following what our town crest says – honouring our past,” said Mayor Dennis Cooper, noting that in each of the past six months 10,000 citizens have come into the multiplex and have seen the curtain. “I'm also a little sad to see it go, but Penhold's name is going to be shared throughout Canada when other Canadians have a chance to view it and see how we honour the past, and challenge the future in moving it around Canada and letting more people see it.”
The post-First World War artifact, which was painted and installed in 1920 by Great War veterans Arthur England and Harold Haste, both of Red Deer, depicts the iconic scene of the war-battered cathedral in Albert, France with a leaning Virgin Mary statue hanging precariously. The scene is famously known as an unforgettable place where Allied soldiers passed near or beneath it in 1916 as they moved during the Battle of the Somme.
While the curtain's painting is valued by historians, its backside is also considered critically important to both national and local heritage, as it contains scores of signatures from past Memorial Hall performers and visitors.
“It (curtain) is a reflection of war commemoration done by people who were actually there. This was not something that somebody imagined. These were people who literally experienced it and came back and recorded in a visual way of what they had seen,” noted Michael Dawe, historian for the City of Red Deer who attended both the unveiling and Sunday's farewell. “That makes it even more poignant because this is something Arthur England and Harold Haste would have literally seen.”
The curtain hung at Memorial Hall for more than four decades before being stored away in the attic in the early 1960s. For the next 40 years it was forgotten until discovered by town officials in 2003 during building renovations. It was then handed over to Ford, who convinced town council three years later to donate it to the Canadian War Museum, which finally began restoring it in 2014 following determined lobbying and financial support by the retired Penhold businessman.
Stewart Ford
"I do feel good about it because we now have it as a national treasure status and it will be beautifully protected in the Canadian War Museum."
