Pro-D Day at the Grist Mill – Educators Open House

On Friday, October 25st, the Grist Mill and Gardens will be hosting a special professional development opportunity for teachers. Come be inspired by this spectacular piece of local history and it’s lovely grounds.

RSVP for free admission to the site for the day, where our staff and volunteers will share some engaging heritage experiences with you, or register for some of the sessions that focus on particular components of the site and how they can be used for creating curriculum connected experiences for students K-12.

Leading you through the days activities will be our General Manager, Chris Mathieson and our Miller, Cuyler Page. Together, they have more than fifty years of curriculum-connected museum program experience designing, delivering and evaluating community-based learning experiences for tens of thousands of students.

Some of the educational amenities on site include:

• Western Canada’s only working waterwheel-powered flour mill
  An amazing opportunity to explore how simple machines can work together to make amazing things
• Beautiful heritage gardens
  Inspired by the paintings and diary of Julia Bullock Webster when she visited the Similkameen in the 1890’s, the grounds provide the perfect location for plein air painting, journaling and more
• Hands-on displays in the 148 year old White Building
  A variety of interactive displays let students learn about the history of the area, how our mill turns a field of wheat into fresh flour ready for baking, and more
• A fully-appointed summer kitchen
  In the heat of the summer, almost all cooking, baking and preserving happened outside in structures like these. It’s also a great place to dye fabric, make candles, do laundry and more.
• Lots of wide open spaces
  Large lawns are the perfect place to explore dozens of old fashioned races, games and other pastimes
• A productive garden
  This site has a long history of growing unusual heritage crops, from rare heritage wheat and the monstrous zucca melon to over a hundred varieties of heritage apple. Follow along, from seed to harvest.

Cuyler Page – Bio

Cuyler Page is a legend in the BC Museum community–he has enjoyed roles as the former site manager of the Grist Mill at Keremeos, curator of the Kamloops Museum and the Maritime Museum of BC in Victoria, exhibitions manager at the Kelowna Museum , exhibit technician at the RBCM, and site manager at Craigflower Historic Site in Victoria.

Born in Ithaca, New York with Cornell University as his childhood playground, Cuyler became a musical omnivore due to all the concerts at the campus–now playing bassoon and contrabassoon with many BC orchestras and chamber ensembles.  Studies in Architecture at Cornell University were followed by Apprenticeship with futurist architect Paolo Soleri in Arizona.  Today, enjoying a career in both museums and music, Cuyler serves as a design consultant for museums throughout BC.  If you’ve ever visited the Grist Mill, you’ve probably met this charming man and maybe seen him on his pennyfarthing bicycle.

Chris Mathieson – Bio

At heart, Chris is a storyteller with a passion for the stories of people, places and objects, having spent the last twenty-five years working in heritage interpretation and education—from an historic one room schoolhouse or in the blacksmith shop at Burnaby Village Museum, as Education Coordinator in the stunning Ming Dynasty-style gardens at the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, as Education Programmer and Executive Director at the Vancouver Police Museum and now as General Manager and Site Operator at the Grist Mill and Gardens Historic Site. More than 40,000 students have taken his curriculum-connected education programs on topics as varied as learning the 3 R’s in the 1920’s, the historical Chinese immigrant experience, the science of modern police work (forensic science) and origins of the food we eat.