Cadet museum opens temporary location in downtown Vernon
Exhibit opening Friday will focus on the Battle Drill School that was located at the Coldstream Ranch
The Vernon Cadet Camp Museum is moving downtown temporarily.
“The Vernon Military Camp is closed because of COVID-19, so we have decided to open an exhibit in downtown Vernon,” said Operations Manager Maria Brunskill.
The Winged Lightning Bolt Exhibit, which opens Friday in the Sun Valley Mall on 30th Avenue, will focus on the Battle Drill School that was located at the Coldstream Ranch.
Museum volunteers, who have worked tirelessly to assemble and present the exhibit include curator Francois Arsenault, Lisa Devine, Dan Emde, Mitch Steck, Corey Schultz and Dale Dickie.
“We have also used a Young Canada Works grant to hire an archival assistant for the summer,” said Brunskill. “Darrah Bridges combines academic credentials in fine arts, history and political science and she is currently working on a criminal justice diploma from Medicine Hat College.”
The exhibit will be feature over 100 photos of military history in the Vernon area between 1940-45. A never-before viewed film of the training that took place at the Battle School in Vernon and on the Coldstream Ranch, as well as a number of artifacts and documents from the First and Second World Wars and the cadet camp will be on display.
There is also a gift shop that features items such as Second World War T-shirts with the lighting wing emblem, and golf shirts.
The Coldstream Ranch Battle Drill School was built at the Coldstream Ranch, six kilometres east of Vernon, in 1942. It was the first FIBUA (Fighting in Built up Areas) training centre in the world.
In 1944 it moved to the Vernon Military Camp. It was used for advanced infantry training where realworld situations brought home from the European front were applied in life-saving training exercises. Over 7,000 men trained in Vernon during the Second World War.
To this day, unexploded artillery and mortar shells used in training are still turned up by the frost and development of the surrounding hills.
Internment camps were also located in Vernon during the world wars; in the First World War for Ukrainian Canadians (this camp is now the site of W.L. Seaton Secondary School) and in the Second for people of Japanese descent (mostly from Vancouver).
After the Second World War, the main camp on Highway 97 was mothballed. In 1949, it was reopened and became an Army Cadet Training Centre for the Royal Canadian Army Cadets.
The exhibit will be open to the public TuesdaySunday from 10-6. Admission is by donation.
Construction Drilling Inc. and Fastik Printing and Packaging have sponsored the display.
Donors include 899 Wing RCAFS, Tim Hortons Vernon, Greater Vernon Museum and Archives, Five Star Awards, Graham and Maria Brunskill and The Men’s Shed of Vernon.