Picture mapping memories of Lacombe to celebrate Canada 150

Residents and visitors in the City of Lacombe are asked to take some time to submit their photos to help create an interactive map of memories to celebrate Canada’s 150th birthday.

The Lacombe community Memory project is an initiative by the Lacombe and District Historical Society with the partnership of Lacombe Regional Tourism. Executive director of both groups, Marie Péron, said it’s an exciting project.

“The idea behind it is to map the memories of Lacombe, not only of the past but of the present day memories of the community and capture the people and places that make up Lacombe and our community as it is today,” said Péron.

As a part of the memory project there are a number of separate initiatives and activities including some that kicked off just before Canada Day this year. Péron added that the memory mapping project is one of the more participatory projects.

“We want to encourage people to go around whether it’s with their phone or their camera and share [their photos] with us through our website that we built where we can literally map the memories and pinpoint locations where buildings are or community gatherings or events have taken place.”

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Péron said it will be a great project once completed because in fifty years, people can once again look back and see what Lacombe looked like and how it has progressed once again.

She added that the community archive has a lot of pictures from the early days of Lacombe from the 1900’s to about the 19040’s or 1950’s, but that there is a large gap not filled in. The gap, Péron said, is from about the 1960’s until even the early 2000’s.

“This is an opportunity for people to not only share pictures of the community and what it looks like today, but helps us map the transformation of our community from over the last fifty to sixty years.”

Photos can be everything from the buildings around town, favorite spots to walk or sit, personal homes, historic homes, or even people celebrating events or hosting gatherings. “We have a lot of historic pictures of families posing in front of their homes or businesses they might have owned, so it would be nice to continue that tradition.”

At the end of the project, Péron said the goal is to potentially create some exhibits or displays to be shared back with the community. Ideally, the memory map will also be available digitally afterwards for people to flip through much like a photo album.

A more hands-on approach to the memory project is being held at the Michener House Museum on Saturday mornings from 10 a.m. until noon. Families are invited to come out and paint portraits or buildings as part of the program called “Art in the Garden.”

The Art in the Garden program runs until the end of August, while the online memory mapping project runs through to December 31.

“We just want to emphasize that even though Canada Day has passed, we are still celebrating the anniversary. There are going to be lots of opportunities for people to be involved with the festivities and it’s an opportunity for us to really capture what Canada is like in 2017.”