As an organization, we have come quite a long way in our contributions to public safety, and it is important to remember how we got to where we are today. While memories will fade, the collection of interesting items at Canada’s Penitentiary Museum will forever live on as a reminder.

Originally named the Canadian Penitentiary Service Museum, the facility officially opened in 1967 as part of Canada’s Centennial celebration. The museum was originally located in the Coach House at the Canadian Penitentiary Service Staff College in Kingston.

“In the beginning, the museum only contained a small collection of contraband items that had been collected by College Superintendent Bob Cunningham in the late 1950s and early 1960s,” says Dave St. Onge, the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC’s) Museum Historian. “These items had originally been collected to show new guards what contraband items might look like and be used for.”

Over the next few years, artifacts trickled in and information about the museum got around. In 1973, after gaining some publicity in various publications, including CSC’s Discussion Magazine, the museum received a donation of more than 100 artifacts and archival materials from Byron Duffy, a Personnel Officer at Dorchester Penitentiary in New Brunswick. Duffy had collected these items between 1952 and 1972.

“We received some great historical articles relating to Dorchester’s history. Mr. Duffy even retrieved contraband and condemned articles that had been disposed of into the nearby Memramcook River,” says Murray Millar, the museum’s founder and retired Kingston Staff College Director. “Among them was the wooden triangle, which was used in earlier times for corporal punishment.”

Historical articles continued to come in, and by the mid-1980s, the museum was running out of display room. As a result, in 1985, the museum moved to Cedarhedge, the former warden of Kingston Penitentiary’s residence.

Similar to the museum’s official opening, this move marked a CSC milestone, as it coincided with Kingston Penitentiary’s 150^th anniversary events. On June 1, 1985, as part of the celebration, the facility was officially opened as the Correctional Service of Canada Museum, a name that would remain until the early 2000s.

“Since 2002, the museum has been more commonly known as Canada’s Penitentiary Museum,” says St. Onge. “Among other reasons, this change was brought about in an effort to enhance public understanding of our mandate, and to help identify it as the only museum in Canada specifically dedicated to the preservation and interpretation of the history of Canada’s federal penitentiaries.”

Today, the museum is home to quite a fascinating collection of artifacts relating to every aspect of Canada’s correctional history. Contraband weapons and escape paraphernalia reflect inmate ingenuity and resourcefulness. Early punishment and restraint equipment provide insight into the methods that were used to keep order and discipline in CSC institutions. And offender hobby crafts display the artistic side of life in prison.

So, next time you find yourself in the Kingston area, be sure to stop in and get a first-hand look at CSC’s history.

Dave St.Onge, Museum Historian, stands in an exhibit room filled with artifacts at the CSC museum. The museum has hosted thousands of penitentiary-curious visitors since it opened in 1967.