Turning tragedy into tourism

Page 17

May seems to be an eventful month for the Kanata Iroquoian Village in Brantford, Ont. It was in May 2000 when it opened its doors to its first tourists. It was May 2002 that it was declared by the Canadian Tourism Commission a national winner for it tour "White Pine Experience." And it was in May 2003 that it was destroyed.

With the tourist season about to begin, staff and supporters at Kanata Village are uniting to wrestle opportunity from crisis.

At a little after 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 8, passersby noticed flames coming from inside the palisade at the Kanata village. The Brantford Fire Department responded to a call and the fire was extinguished in less than an hour. But in that hour the fire completely destroyed the 17th century longhouse and all of its contents. Total damage is set at $150,000.

The longhouse contained hides, wooden bowls, baskets and other artifacts, all of which needs to be replaced.

The fire department discovered that four separate fires were set at different locations around the three-year-old facility, which leads authorities to believe the fire was the result of arson.

Skip Pennell, administrator at Kanata, although devastated by the loss, began to focus on rebuilding. He quickly called his supplier of cedar poles and bark near Cornwall and made arrangements for new materials to be shipped.

While calls from supporters in the community began to flood in, staff at Kanata Village began making their own telephone calls to the 52 pre-booked tour contacts. Surprisingly, the majority of them still expressed an interest in coming for their tour.

According to Pennell, the idea of being able to watch a longhouse being constructed was fascinating to them.

"We may just leave the charred remains of the longhouse as is, because that's how it was long ago too," said Aaron Bell, cultural interpreter at Kanata. Bell was saddened by the loss of the longhouse where he had spent much of the last three years conducting tours.

Pennell has plans to film the construction of the new longhouse, which was not a feature that had originally been done. The educational and historical value of such a film would be a welcome addition to Kanata's extensive teaching tools they use during their tours.

Since the fire, Pennell has noticed that the general walk-in visitors have declined, but tours are, surprisingly, increasing.

"As far as our booked tours go, we only lost two of the 52 originally booked. And we've booked another eight," he said. "Eighty per cent of our tours are still done in the interpretive centre," said Pennell.

The rebuilding process has been in full swing for the past couple of weeks.

"We're building two longhouses," said Pennell. "They're going to be bigger and better. It's going to take 931 cedar poles per longhouse and 18,000 square feet of bark. Two hundred palisade poles also need to be replaced," he said. "Our goal is to complete them by the second week in August."

Pennell is overwhelmed by all the support and encouragement received since this tragedy. He commended his staff for their quick and loyal response to the rebuilding plan. He knows how much of themselves they had put into the original longhouse construction. "Our souls beat in the soil of the earth," he said.