It’s said that you can never truly know where you’re going unless you know where you’ve been and with all the recent upheaval going on in our small city, reflecting on our past when making future decisions might not be the worst idea.
The Chestermere Historical Foundation strives to educate residents on the history of Chestermere. Whether you’ve lived here 5 days or 50 years, there is always importance in knowing where you come from and the historical growth of where you come from. The Chestermere Historical Foundation (CHF) was established April 1, 2011. It was preceded by the Chestermere Historical Society which existed from 1961 until 1994. The current Executive and Board Members are:
President – Jen Peddlesden
Vice President – Kay Clarke
Secretary – Lori Nielsen
Treasurer – Audrey McDonald
Board Members – Ray Blanchard, Ray Hessler and Glen Clarke
If you’ve ever had the opportunity to speak to any of these individuals, you’ll know that they are all very passionate about Chestermere and its history.
The Objectives of the CHF are as follows:
1. Creating a public interest in local and regional history with particular focus on the rail, irrigation and agricultural influence.
2. Discovering, preserving and perpetuating facts and artefacts relevant to an appreciation of the history of Chestermere.
3. Making historic artefacts available to all interested parties where possible.
4. Promoting, preserving and restoring historic entities with significance to Chestermere
5. Documenting Chestermere history in words and pictures, including family histories and the history of local clubs and associations.
6. Educating about local history
7. Encouraging and supporting historical events and programs working cooperatively with other agencies to this end
8. Working in cooperation with the City of Chestermere, other local municipalities and regional historical societies to fulfill the objectives of the society
9. Encouraging research and publications relating to the history of Chestermere
One of the CHF is to restore one of Chestermeres original firetrucks. “On Saturday June 6th the Chestermere Historical Foundation partnered with Robin Impey at M & M Meats Chestermere to do a BBQ and a 50/50 draw to do some last fundraising to finish the 1952 Ford firetruck used by the Chestermere Cabin Owners Association”, explained CHF President, Jen Peddlesden.
“As in the past, the Chestermere Scotiabank employees (five of them this time!) took time off on a sunny Saturday to kindly offer their help flipping burgers, unwrapping cheese (one of the hardest jobs in a pair of plastic gloves!) and sell 50/50 tickets. The Chestermere Lakeside Kruzers pitched in and were there for a mini-show-n-shine and day shift firefighters at Firehall #59 in Chestermere also helped out. The result of that hard work was $1172 and on Monday, December 21st the Chestermere Historical Foundation was extremely pleased to accept a matching amount from Manager Leighton Milliken and Manager Greg Moffatt from the Chestermere branch of Scotiabank” said Peddlesden.
Greg Moffatt, Small Business Advisor at the Chestermere branch of Scotiabank commented, “We partnered with the Chestermere Historical Foundation because as a bank we are community driven and while we make some large donations on big stages, such as the our support of Syrian refugees, we are a grass roots bank and this donation came from our corporate fundraising matching program where the bank will match outside funds raised by Scotiabankers in the community. Additionally, Scotiabank is an organization with deep roots and respect for history as you can see in the many photographs displayed on our walls with various Scotiabank’s throughout history”.
Peddlesden continued, “Watch for the little red truck out on the road in summer 2016! Thank you Scotia Bank management and staff for your continuous support of this important historical project in the city of Chestermere”.
