The local museum was one of two museums to recently be honoured with the B.C. Historical Federation's Cultural Resource Accessibility Award.
The Cultural Resource Accessibility Award honours museums that undertake efforts to make history, archives and cultural resources more accessible for everyone.
The Agassiz-Harrison Museum received the accolade thanks to the recent digitization project, resulting in "improved online access to the organization's archival and newspaper holdings," which includes the Agassiz Record, Agassiz Advance and Agassiz-Harrison Observer. The online archives currently run from 1923 to 1958.
Museum manager Maria Martins told The Observer she and the team were honoured to receive the award from the Historical Federation.
" Sometimes it is not possible for community members to come here in person to research, and often people are not aware of our extensive archival holdings. So, we are doing what we can to make our collections available online and to raise awareness of this community resource," Martins stated. "Volunteers continue to work on digitizing our artifact records, historic newspapers, and photographs, and we have new people interested in volunteering for these projects all the time. Our eventual goal is to have all our collections digitized and available online for viewing."
The museum unveiled their digitized newspaper collection in December 2024. The project includes not only the newspapers from 1923 to 1958 but thousands of historical photos and documents, expanding the museum's digital collection. Volunteers devoted hundreds of hours, and a number of grants to the Agassiz-Harrison Historical Society made it possible.
The Revelstoke Museum and Archives also received the Cultural Resource Accessibility Award. Their accessibility project developed sensory kits and audio tours for those living with disabilities.
The awards were presented in Williams Lake on May 3, and the museums split a $500 prize in addition to receiving certificates.
Based in Fort Langley, the B.C. Historical Federation was established in 1922. The federation, now consisting of 100 member societies and 24,000 people, is dedicated to preserving and presenting the history of British Columbia.
The Agassiz-Harrison Museum's digital archives are online now at agassizharrisonmuseum.org/archive.