Last year, the Archives received a grant from the American Academy of Franciscan History to preserve and make accessible the photographs and audiovisual materials in our collection. In addition to photographs, negatives, and slides, our Archives also holds VCR tapes, film reels, vinyl records, magnetic audio reels, audio cassette tapes, and microcassette tapes! With the grant, we purchased supplies and equipment and also worked on digitizing many of the materials in the Archives for greater accessibility.
The following video clip is one of the many that the Archives now has digitized! Originally an 8 mm film reel, the video depicts the 50th anniversary celebration of St. Francis Parish in Edmonton, AB, in 1959. The video clip below shows Fr. Boniface Heidmeier, the founder of St. Francis Parish, visiting the first church building from 1909.
Compare the video clip with the photograph below of a young Fr. Boniface standing outside the same church in 1909!