A historian from Smith was one of three recipients of the outstanding achievement award handed out Oct. 26 during the Heritage Awards ceremonies at Edmonton Place.
Sheila Willis was nominated by the Municipal District of Lesser Slave River. In a nomination letter to the Alberta Historical Resources Foundation Heritage Awards Program dated June 27, Reeve Murray Kerik said that Willis has made significant contributions to the protection, preservation and promotion of Alberta’s heritage.
“Sheila catalogued 100 sites of local history for Alberta’s first ever Geo Tour for the Smith centennial in 2014,” Kerik said in the letter. “She has discovered artifacts and provided them to the Royal Alberta Museum and the Glenbow Archives, founded the Friends of Historical Northern Alberta Society (FHNAS) and is their volunteer Executive Director.”
Kerik added Willis began her quest to share northern Alberta history with children in classrooms.
“She then did so as a member of the Smith Community Development Council,” he continued in the letter. “Her focus has always been to combine tourism and history to encourage others to come north of Edmonton including Smith.”
Willis said it was quite an honour to be nominated.
“I received my award for doing a bunch of volunteer activities in promoting heritage tourism,” Willis said. “The geo tour in Smith was the first of its kind in Alberta. It involves people hiding containers with swag in each one, and it gives people around the world a chance to come and find them.”
She said some of her containers included Canada stickers, skipping ropes, MD pins, as well as toys and decks of cards.
“You do not put smelly items in the containers,” Willis said. “I actually did make that mistake once, when I put an air freshener in one. Also, you do not put food inside the container.”
Through her work with the FHNAS, she said they were able to develop and market the History Check Mobile App.
“I started building that in 2015,” Willis said. “It works on beta software, Apple, as well as most Android models. We currently have 1,600 sites on this app, and we are going through with partnerships with other historical societies and researchers and marking sites of history and telling stories.”
In addition, Willis said they are also including things like boat launches, community halls, as well as picnic locations.
“It will even tell you where you can buy fuel,” she said. “It includes anything and everything to roll out the red carpet for visitors.”
A total of 12 awards were handed out in five categories, which include Outstanding Achievement, Heritage Conservation, Heritage Awareness, Indigenous Heritage and Youth Heritage.
See AWARD, Page 5
“Thanks to the contributions of individual Albertans, heritage organizations, business and community leaders, the stories of our province’s past will continue to be shared with generations to come,” Culture and Tourism minister Ricardo Miranda said in a news release. “Recipients of the 2018 heritage awards are leading the way, helping to strengthen the cultural fabric of Alberta and inspiring others to get involved in preserving our rich history and heritage.”
Willis said there were three awards handed out to people from northern Alberta this year.
“One was the winner of the youth award, which went to Jordan Born, a young gentleman who since the age of 14 has been volunteering and taking pictures at the Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village,” she said. “As well, the Highland Community Hall of Barich Society took home a Heritage Conservation award for its efforts to restore the old hall built in Smoky Lake County.”
Willis originally hailed from Salmon Arm, British Columbia, and first arrived in Smith back in 1995.
“I originally came to the area as a tourist, but I loved the area and decided to stay,” she said. “At that point, it had been a long time since I lived in a small community, and I really missed it. I have never lived anywhere else ever since.”
During the 2014 centennial, she said one of her talents was finding the descendants of some of Smith’s earliest citizens.
“In the case of the man the community is named after, I was able to find his grandchildren living in Virginia,” she said. “One of those grandchildren, as well as a great-grandchild, actually came up for the centennial and I met them at the train station.”
She added that history is her passion, and that her particular interest is in northern Alberta history.
“The history of Alberta actually started in the north,” Willis said. “Fort Vermilion and Fort Chipewyan are our two oldest settlements, and in Smith the steamboat trade tied in with the Athabasca River. We also had a German POW camp in the second world war, we had the Alaskan Highway, and of course the railway.”
All in all, she said she is very thankful to continue to follow her passion.
