Anyone who has loved the Corning Museum of Glass in New York has to pop up to Toronto for the Gardiner Museum of ceramics. It displays ceramicware from all over the world throughout all periods of human history. Porcelain was a luxury item during the 17th and 18th centuries and Read more
Visitors have to go through security before entering the Toronto Police Museum on the ground floor of the force’s headquarters on College Street. The dimly-lit museum is a series of three exhibition galleries connected by snaking slopes. Admission is free. The first gallery exhibits police uniform, badges, and standard issue Read more
Just down the street from the Royal Ontario Museum and the Gardiner Museum, the Bata Shoe Museum is one of of the few free museums on Sundays in Toronto. Its story is basically the history of shoes and how different periods of western history show through European fashion. The exhibitions Read more
Kingston was an important defensive position on the St. Lawrence River facing rebellious America. Fort Henry is the largest fortification along the St. Lawrence waterway west of Quebec City. It was built.in response to the War of 1812 and the limestone citadel was built in the 1830s. It was never Read more
The telephone was conceived and invented in this house in Brantford, Ontario. Alexander Graham Bell lived here with his parents after they moved over from Edinburgh. Bell had a handwritten note detailing where he was during each stage of development to allay any future concerns about where the telephone was Read more
The River of History Museum in the Michigan side of Sault Ste. Marie is a history museum on the St. Mary’s River. It shows how Natives lived before European arrival and their interactions with Europeans in the centuries that followed. Its interpretation of the violent history between the US and Read more
Parliament Hill in Ottawa has been under renovation since 2019 and there’s about a decade of work left. While the Senate was moved to the old Union Station, the House of Commons stayed in the same building. It moved its chamber from inside the building to the courtyard and covered Read more
The Senate of Canada was founded in 1867 with its confederation, but it is currently held in an old train station in Ottawa built in 1912 opposite the senate’s original purpose-built building. Funnily enough, the former train station is older than the 1920 Parliament Centre Block, which has been undergoing Read more
Located right across the street from the Kingston Penitentiary, Correctional Service Canada’s museum is housed inside Cedarwood, the former house of the prison warden. Entry is free. The lower level has exhibits on early forms of punishment, basically torture, for prisoners until 1969. Water boarding, locking inside a coffin, and Read more
Sharing the grounds with the Kingston General Hospital, the Museum of Health Care has the same long history as the 1830s hospital. It is the largest hospital between Toronto and Ottawa and only hospital in Canada to still be in its original building. The museum building used to be dormitories Read more