Some founding Kinetic Club members practicing song parodies in the Healy Hotel for International Days, 1939.  The club president found himself being questioned by police after some Kinetic Club members sent telegrams to the German and Italian embassies inviting Mussolini and Hitler to the event.

 World War II greatly influenced the first few years of the Kinetic Club.  Many floats were very patriotic, and lots of money was raised for the war effort.  Many members of the Kinetic Club enlisted.

Winnie the bulldog (named after Winston Churchill) was raffled during Frontier Days in 1941.  He was donated to the minesweeper H.M.C.S. Swift Current as a mascot in 1943, but he was killed in a tussle with an ox in a Halifax port and buried at sea.

Blowtorch, William McIntyre’s famous mechanical horse, became a favourite part of the post-war Frontier Days parades.

For more information about Frontier Days, visit the Swift Current Museum.

Superintendent L.B. Thomson was instrumental to the early development of the Experimental Farm.  Thomson Lake, by Gravelbourg, was named after him.

Soils laboratory staff.  Call the Museum if you recognize anyone!

Data collected in 1924.

An irrigation ditch at the Research Station, c. 1930s.

Stop by the Museum to find out more information about the Research Station!

While most of the Airmen were British, some came from all over the Commonwealth, from as far away as the Caribbean.

Recreational activities on the base included sports teams, dances, movies and live theatrical presentation, put on by the airmen, staff and local young women.  This picture shows four airmen performing in a comedy revue.

The young men struck up friendships with the young women who lived in Swift Current, and were invited into the homes of the community for meals and social gatherings.

Farewells at the train station were a common occurrence, as the young men received their Wings, and left Swift Current to join the war effort.

Lee Lam with his wife and sons, taken in China in 1929.  Lee finally managed to bring him family to Canada after the Chinese Communist Revolution, in the early 1950s.

Lee Lam ran the Webster Height grocery store and Swift Current Market Gardens on Railway St. south for many years.

The Lee Lam bridge leads into a neighbourhood nicknamed Piper’s Addition, because the first owners of the lot right across from the bridge were named Piper.

Piper’s Addition and its adjacent neighbourhood, Webster Heights, have been especially vulnerable when the creek floods during spring runoff.

60^th wedding anniversary of John and Isabella Oman, 1938.

John Oman’s house on Oman hill (near centre) in reference to Oman School (right).

When the school was built, it was occasionally referred to as South Side School.

In 1960, a brick addition was added to the right side of the old building, and later became the main entrance for the school.  The original building had been used for storage for a few years before it was torn down.  The final class attended Oman School in 2013-2014.

This photo was taken in 1911 by the current site of Chinook golf course.  The 76 Ranch buildings are on the horizon on the right hand side.

Ranch House and buildings, taken from south of the buildings looking north.

Bunk house at the Swift Current 76 Ranch.

76 Ranch manager Pelham Clinton and recruiter Jim Smart.

This is the only photograph of the building that the Museum has at this point.  Please call the Museum if you have any others!  

An early ad for the dance hall from the late 1920s.  Published in The Sun newspaper.  

In 1955 new ownership took over the hall, and it was re-opened under the name Club ’76, named after the 76 Ranch.  It was badly damaged by fire 1963.  The building was razed and replaced by a fourplex by 1967.

The fact that Swift Current was a “divisional point” was important to the town’s growth.  This meant that the trains would be serviced here, in the roundhouse, creating more permanent CPR jobs in Swift Current.

This aerial shot of the roundhouse shows the old CPR water tower and the walking bridge to the southside.  The photo was taken in the 1930s.

Interior of the roundhouse.  Some people on the southside used to cut through the roundhouse when walking across the tracks when it was cold out. 

Roundhouses began to obsolete when diesel engines became standard, as diesel engines could run in either direction and did not need to be turned around on a turn table.  From the air, the foundation of the round house forms a crescent shape to this day.

The Swift Current Museum has several photographs of the interior and exterior of the horse processing plant.  Many were taken by noted Saskatchewan photographer, Everett Baker  Come to the Museum to see more!

Tommy Douglas speaking at the grand opening in 1946.

The corrals with the ramp into the plant.

Women working on the canning line.

Men processing horse carcasses.

Carl Holmes was one of the people who operated an abattoir south of the Nuisance Ground on Railway, and used the site for animal waste.

The “honey wagon” also unloaded at the nuisance ground.  Some houses in Swift Current did not get indoor plumbing until the 1940s.

Apparently, there were so many rats at the Nuisance Grounds in the 1940s that you just had to turn your car lights on to see them scatter.  It was a popular site for target practice!