The History of Living History

Abstract

The middle decades of the 20th century saw a proliferation in Canada of rebuilt pioneer villages and historic forts. Such living-history museums quickly became among the most important tools for education about Canada’s past. Between the legions of school children who annually trekked through their gates, and summer tourists in search of entertaining attractions, they presented history to more people than academic historians could ever hope to reach. Yet, such sites are often not taken seriously by academic historians. Scholars sometimes belittle living history museums as happy history or as a “Disneyfication” of the past. This form of history has been crucial in the construction of historical memory in Canada in the post-war period. Adressing the context of the ongoing growth of memory studies, these sites offer us the most popular place where everyday Canadians have engaged formally with history and memory.