EXHIBITS
The Gem of the West features over 15 unique exhibits focusing on the history and heritage of Coaldale and the surrounding area.
Visit our First Nations exhibit for a timeline of stone points, including a 12,000-year-old Clovis point, the first found in Alberta.
Discover Main Street Coaldale through exhibits that reconstruct historic grocery stores, a one-room schoolhouse, and the CPR station.
See the typewriter used by B.B. Janz, who helped over 21,000 Mennonites flee religious persecution in the Soviet Union during the 1920s and 30s.
Visit our Butcher Shop exhibit and see a variety of equipment used in Coaldale’s butcher shop, which has been in business for over 95 years!
Learn about the various cultures which settled in the area and helped establish and develop our town.
Tour our on-site operational blacksmith shop and see the various historic tools used.
Enjoy the unique features of our building, a former Mennonite Brethren Church built in 1939, which today is a Registered Historic Resource.
New in 2018: See the wedding dress worn by Elizabeth Bruce when she married William Anderson in 1912, part of our new short-term exhibit celebrating historic clothing and accessories.
New in 2019: Visit our redesigned exhibit in tribute to the New Club Cafe. This will be a long-term exhibit featuring the original counter and benches that furnished the cafe, on which the names of cafe patrons can still be carved into the wood.
New in 2022: Explore our newly rejuvenating indigenous exhibit space, which will be incorporated into new information boards and another interactive video element. This project came to fruition with lots of help and was completed by the beginning of May.
New in 2024: Our new exhibit showcases how laundry has come a long way from the days of washboards, tubs, and clotheslines. Its history is a fascinating story that includes the lives of some Coaldale residents and their businesses. Learn how this time-consuming and labour-intensive task evolved with the invention of washing machines, dryers, and other modern appliances, making laundry more convenient.