The Beckoning Hills Museum in Boissevain has been a long-time fixture in the community but people haven’t been able to stop by to see the items since 2019. 

The pandemic and a lack of volunteers to staff the museum means the doors haven’t been open over the past four years. 

A new group of volunteers has stepped forward with the goal of re-opening the museum so people can see what it has to offer. Beckoning Hills has unique collections and antique items gathered from throughout Boissevain and the region. From old fashions, appliances and school items. 

“Right now, we’re doing a lot of cleaning and we got started with that work this week. We’re also moving stuff around and making new exhibits. We’re also working with the library and getting some of the pictures digitized and we're working with the Wildlife Museum and maybe making some exhibits with them” said museum co-chair Sandra Pearce. 

“We're hoping to open the doors by May, and we’ll start with weekends, and we’ll see how many volunteers we can get to help out.” 

Pearce says the museum has about 10,000 items and they’re all out on display. “We don’t have anything in storage, and everything is out.” 

Volunteers are busy scrubbing and cleaning. Some displays are being set up while other items are being rearranged. 

“We have our own bank account and we’ve been applying for grants to help cover some of our costs. Things are coming along pretty good. We aren’t going to have everything done but we hope to have a lot of work completed so we can open the doors sometime in May,” said Pearce. 

“We’ve been closed for a while, and we need to get rid of that layer of dust. We want to spruce it up and we’ve done some painting with the displays and that's really helped spruce it up. It needs a freshening up just like everything else."