- by Jan Raska, PhD, Historian (Updated October 26, 2020) Introduction V-E (Victory in Europe) Day, May 8, 1945, marked not only the beginning of the return home from Europe for Canadian military personnel, but also a new period in immigration to Canada. During the war, immigration had slowed almost …
- by Jan Raska, PhD, Historian (Updated September 28, 2020) Introduction: Adolescent Impressions of Immigrating to Canada An often overlooked aspect of Pier 21’s site history is the immigration experience of children. Young newcomers are frequently mentioned in relation to the immigration process and …
- by Jan Raska, PhD, Historian (Updated October 23, 2020) Introduction How do I find a passenger list? Is there a ledger? What if my ancestor came from a country that no longer exists? While the Scotiabank Family History Centre at the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 does not hold copies of …
- I just hung up the phone with Patricia Roberts-Pichette and find myself writing in the hopes that someone out there can help us with a question. Patricia wrote to me back in 2011 while researching her book on the Middlemore home children. During our correspondence I mentioned that a visitor had let …
- I received an email on January 2 nd from a very excited Margot Tarajos. She asked if we would be open for her visit 363 days later. Margot was two and a half on New Year’s Eve in 1955 when her family arrived at Pier 21 and was ready to start planning a 60 th anniversary trip back. She wrote, “ We …
- Ralph and Kay (McAndrew) Collicott Joanne Collicott Mc Guigan was born to Canadian serviceman Ralph Benjamin Collicott and his war bride Kay on a Halloween night. The moon was full as bombs fell around the Hammersmith hospital demolishing half a block across the street. After the war her father …
- We often say that the War Brides followed their hearts to Canada, and so they did, but they were not the only ones. From the Italian proxy brides to those who met on ships as children only to find each other years later in Canada we have had the opportunity to hear a lot of love stories. I think of …
- Since the Museum opened in 1999 we have been collecting stories, pictures, interviews and friends. Re-imagining the Pier 21 exhibit has given us a chance to bring some of the chapters in the site’s history to life by sharing our friends' stories. I get to do this by building five trunks based on …
- Peter Biesheuvel and his son Brian visited the Museum early on a Saturday morning. I told my husband that I would meet them at 9:30 a.m., show them around the exhibit and leave when they went into the 10 a.m. multimedia film screening, thus returning the car to him by 10:30 a.m. Well, Peter, Brian …
- by Jan Raska, PhD, Historian (Updated October 15, 2020) Introduction: Canadian Customs before and after the Second World War In May 2015, the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 opened new exhibitions on the history of the Pier 21 National Historic Site of Canada and the history of …