The Perth Museum is a historic site with a dedicated cast of volunteers and staff willing to put in the effort needed to help their community. From donating produce to updating accessibility resources
Location and Hours
11 Gore St E, Perth, ON K7H 1H4
The Museum is on the main street in Perth and parking can be difficult during the summer. Any day but Saturday I suggest parking at the Market Building and walking up.
During the Summer the Museum is open 10am-6pm daily. I am unsure if that changes in the off-seasons.
Ease of Access
As stated above, parking in Perth can be tricky. It is a small, tourist town with many cottages on the surrounding lakes. It is also quite hot in the summer time with temperatures regularly in the high 20s. If mobility is not an issue for you, parking lots are located at the Library, the Market, and the Old Mill. There is street parking but it can be difficult to find places. Parking is metered in Perth so bring some loose change with you.
Though the museum fronts onto Gore Street, I recommend going to the upper end of the building and into the garden towards the ‘visitor information’ entrance. There is a small ramp and some people to greet you. Conversely you can use the steps from Gore to enter. The ground floor has been largely restored to its historic look but with added ramps for accessibility.
The second and third floors, presently, are not accessible by elevators. This is too bad because my favourite parts were all on the third floor.
Tour Notes
I went to the Perth Museum with my grandma and uncle, neither of whom share my passion for museums. They like them well enough but I was going too slow for them so I was soon left behind. Not to be dramatic or anything but this is the sort of abandonment that chases young people into academia!
We entered through the side as described in the Ease of Access section, much to my surprise! Grandma had been there before and knew all that important stuff. There were a few people in the Visitor Information centre not all of whom work for the museum itself. Once we indicated a desire to visit the museum we were handed a self-guided tour, told “Entrance is by Donation”, and ushered into the kitchen.
As ever, lovely readers, I donated 5 dollars and encourage you to do the same.
The Ground Floor
The ground floor of 11 Gore Street has been remodeled and restored to the historic 1840s look that the Matheson family would be familiar with. This includes the kitchen, dining room, and sitting room along with the connecting hallways.
The kitchen is three or four steps below the rest of the house but, there is a ramp! You can navagate your way throughout the entire kitchen except for a room I suspect was a pantry. It is dioramatic – or with elements of dioramas. There is fake bread on the table, pots hanging above a cold fireplace, and other odds and ends that make it look like someone just stepped out before tea. The sitting room and dining room, however, are roped off and can only be viewed from the hall door.
Its all very well done with impressive recreations of 19th century wall paper. I only wish you could walk around those two rooms like you can the kitchen.
The Upper Floors
As I was about to ascend the stairs I asked an employee if there was an accessible way to get there. He said no, unfortunately, and I explained Museum Spaces briefly. He comes back into this a little later. At the first landing is another dioramatic sitting room but the third floor houses cases!
As museums have evolved they have moved away from dioramas and towards cases or displays. These can be done in a few different ways but most museums I have seen choose a like-with-like style of casing. This could mean you have a case of knives from various cultures together in a case or you have a case dedicated to a single culture.
This was the ‘case’ as it were at the Perth Museum as well. There was a truly stylish display of local geology, a case on the local indigenous Iroquois, and a case about the clothing/textiles of the area, to name but a few.
It was here that the friendly employee comes back. He has spoken to a co-worker about my questions and has been sent to get my contact information. We spoke briefly – really only long enough for me to lament leaving my business cards at home – and that was that. I have had similar experiences in the past. People being very enthusiastic about the idea of accessibility but then never following up with it. This is why The Follow Through is such an important aspect of accessibility resources.
That was not the case with the Perth Museum. By the time I got home there was an introductory email from a woman looking for advice.
Perth Museum Website?
It was through this exchange where I discovered that the Perth Museum has photo books of the upper levels for guests who cannot or don’t want to ascend the stairs. This is not an uncommon stop-gap in accessibility especially in historic buildings. As discussed in Returning Home to the AGN, historic buildings bring complications that other museum spaces do not face.
Before my visit I attempted to check out the Museum’s website. It turns out that this is more of a webpage on the town’s website. Here’s the link to that page. They have a few social media accounts linked there as well. Things I would like to see there include: information about parking, a contact for the museum (the one on the page is the town), and some accessibility notes.
I don’t know who Perth Museum sees as their primary audience, and I know that changing webpages controlled by other bodies is complicated, but given their commitment to developing access I think the effort to update it is worth it.
There will be no more scoring
I will no longer be scoring museums out of 10. Instead I will work hard to highlight accessibility snares in the body of my text. I enjoyed my time at the Perth Museum but there are a few obvious barriers. The museum is actively trying to counter them, by building ramps, and making books, and following through with plans.
They are also creating access in other ways: they donate the food grown in their courtyard (including grapes and apples at the least) to the local food bank, for example. Museum Spaces is primarily about access to museum spaces but it includes financial access, access to food, and community support access. Perth Museum is actively creating food and community access through this donation.
My conclusion is that the Perth Museum is imperfect but trying so hard to be the type of museum the community needs. I’m only upset that I didn’t visit it before now!