Outdoor Irrigation Exhibit Opening with Richardson Oilseed

Lethbridge—Water: it is essential to life and to our way of life in southern Alberta. But where does our water come from? What is the story of its journey from the Rocky Mountains, through the foothills, prairies and downstream? Since the late nineteenth century, the Oldman watershed has sustained the growth of agriculture and thriving settlements in southern Alberta.

The Galt Museum & Archives is pleased to announce the official opening of our outdoor irrigation exhibit The exhibit was part of the long-term outdoor exhibit master plan at the Galt Museum & Archives. The Friends of the Galt Museum Society began fundraising for this exhibit and looking for corporate partners. In 2014, Richardson Oilseed chose the Friends of the Galt to be the recipients of their golf tournament fundraiser, which added $19,000 to the project.

The outdoor irrigation exhibit lets kids and adults explore and experiment with the functioning of watersheds, dams and irrigation systems. The exhibit features a hand pump that moves water from a tank below the exhibit into the mountains where it is caught by a reservoir dam. Visitors can manipulate a series of sluice gates to control the flow of water into the downstream canals and farms, until the water eventually returns to the storage tank.

“This is a wonderful exhibit that we can use to teach the community about irrigation in southern Alberta” says Chris Roedler, Resource Development and Volunteer Coordinator at the Galt. “We want to thank Richardson Oilseed and the Friends of the Galt for their participation in completing this project.”

The irrigation exhibit was designed by Brad Brown, the Galt’s Exhibit Designer, and manufactured in Lethbridge by Mosaic Industries Inc. The exhibit was initially installed in September 2017 and was later surrounded with a kid-friendly recycled tire surface in the fall of 2018. Our Education staff use the exhibit to teach hundreds students about irrigation and water use in southern Alberta. We are now very pleased to officially open the exhibit with the help of our partners Richardson Oilseed on Thursday June 6, 2019 at 11:30 am.