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| Canadian Communists - We know who you are .... |
 Feedback: #65: Tacoma, WA, USA - "Say, I'm not Canadian but your web site is mighty fine, mighty fine! It really, really inspired me! I'm really keen now to learn much more about this part of history. Man is it fine! And I only saw a small part. Very, very fine work! Just let me say that any Canadian who does not look at your web site has got to be a Communist! And you can tell them I said so...." |
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"Your website is a wonderful celebration of your productive and so very interesting lives. Congratulations!"
- Toronto, ONTARIO
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| Oh Say Can You See! |
| Feedback: # 34: Little Ferry, NJ, USA - "I'm a Civil War reenactor. I just had to call to say what an amazingly terrific site you have. I've never seen anything so nicely done - and I've seen a lot!.... Please send me a set of your programs. I haven't seen them yet, but they've got to be good!" |
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In 1999, the Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum was created in parallel to a television documentary program to commemorate and publicize a forgotten part of Canada's history, the three year long South African War that convulsed Canadians at the turn of the 20th century. Ultimately, some 7,000 Canadian men and women would volunteer for service in South Africa, and come back, energized to revitalize Canada's growth to full nationhood.
 "A most interesting web site." - Glasgow, SCOTLAND
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"Congratulations on an amazing website and documentary."
- Toronto, ONTARIO
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The Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum offered a complete showcase of this stressful transformation, by publicizing the deeds, the people and places, the triumphs and tragedies, that were on every tongue throughout the British Empire, from 1899 to 1902, and for many years afterwards.
| I Say "Splendid old chap!" |
| Feedback: # 46: London, United Kingdom - "I've now had a good trawl through your Boer War website - it's an absolutely splendid site. I'm most impressed by not only its contents and how they are displayed but also the ease with which they can be accessed." |
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Like no other war before, or since, the Great Anglo-Boer War produced memorabilia on a dazzling scale in kind and quantity. In the age before television, movies, and radio, Canadians experienced the war through sheet music, lantern slides, stereo views, lithographs, photos, tobacco silks, and cards, and a blizzard of memorial plates, cups, jugs, busts, kerchiefs, and statues.
To showcase our television feature presentation,
"The Great Anglo-Boer War 1899-1902: The Canadian Experience,"
we were proud to have created the most phenomenally lush web site ever to accompany, or publicize, a television program, anywhere in the world.
"I was impressed by the programming as well as your obvious attention to Canadian history." - Toronto, ONTARIO
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Trail Blazing 1999: We started this web site in 1999 at a time it was truly trail-blazing - as well as the most extensively educational - internet museum in the world. It was an unparalleled examination of a historical era, featuring a glorious array of pictures and memorabilia, linked together by an extensive informational commentary on the personalities and news stories that comprised the Great Anglo Boer War. The result, at the time, was an internet gallery of history second to none anywhere in the world.
"What a grand job." - Houston, TEXAS
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When one surfed the thousands of museums of the world on the internet in 1999, the uniqueness of the Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum became evident. It was virtually impossible to find another museum anywhere which displayed its collections as educational modules on the net. All used the internet, not to make available educational packages, made up of their own collections, but as a "sales tool," an advertising brochure, a promotional flyer, a materials catalogue list (a log of photos, paintings, or audio clips), a bulletin board, or tour guide.
"Much enjoyed visiting your terrific & very colourful website." - Toronto, ONTARIO
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Much Ado About Nothing: The poor use of the internet as a communications medium stemmed from the fact that the new technology baffled most "content-driven" subject experts. "Not for me thanks. It's a nightmare world of crashes on the internet. Keep your viruses, I'll stick with my typewriter, gladly!" was a typical response. Most program managers felt the same way. The result: they eagerly turned the internet communications loop over to "computer nerds" who were gleefully clever at making their web sites jump with action - jumping logos, pulsing screens, automatically triggering windows, etc. a literal smorgasbord of flim and flam. Program managers were impressed with all these attempts to make a computer screen into a video screen. But not web surfers who were looking for serious content.
As one expert noted, "It was much ado about nothing. Computer geeks are not content oriented - they have nothing to say, but are fiendishly clever at saying it."
A very few museums used the odd educational page, but only to promote a show, or to entice people to come in. These were always extremely limited in size and scope, and always offered very few and tiny pictures to accompany them. And too often, because they wanted to show off their web sites to demonstrate how "technologically with it" they were, they created a virtual fire wall of down loads that you had to make before you could even see anything at all. With millions of easy pages to see on the internet, the vast majority of people simply couldn't be bothered to down load viruses etc. These avant garde pages were so technologically complex, that they sabotaged entirely the original educational intent of a web site. You can't educate if your audience walks out because they can't be bothered with trying to batter down a wall of downloads to get in.
"What an excellent web site." - Vancouver, BRITISH COLUMBIA
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In 1999, the web sites of so many other museums were not "educational" in intent; most were overwhelmingly "promotional," and designed to get you to visit the bricks and glass buildings that housed their collections. To learn about the stories their display rooms featured, the heroes and heroines they promoted and publicized, you had to go to their bricks and mortar locations. To get to see their collections, their displays, most visitors would have to travel a long way, arrive only during business hours, and also pay an entrance fee. To get an education with all of them, you had to pay. Most people would only be able to visit a particular museum - say the Smithsonian in Washington, DC - once, or at best twice, in their lives. Countless others - in fact millions of taxpayers who pay taxes to sustain them - would never get the chance at all.
We did not think this fair.
"I was very impressed with the Boer War information. Interesting pieces of information, well presented." - Liverpool, UNITED KINGDOM
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To strike out in new directions, in 1999, the Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum offered a huge and growing informational smorgasbord of the entire history of the Boer War - with special focus on Canada - using thousands of words and many hundreds of large and magnificent full colour pictures of people, places, and memorabilia, all assembled into comprehensive informational modules that anyone could easily get at, and follow.
"WOW is right! What a great web site and wonderful show
that you have put together." - Clinton, ONTARIO
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And far from being only a display of dusty archival materials, the Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum offered detailed pictures of the places as they are today, linking the past with the present, in a riveting "History Alive" type presentation. And all our galleries were instantly accessible to anyone around the world, at a moment's notice. And all for free. And for as many times as one wanted.
 "Please let me congratulate you on your web site.
It is extremely viewer friendly."
- Adelaide, AUSTRALIA
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Internet surfers especially responded most warmly to our interface.
At a time when everyone got hopelessly lost, trying to find their way around most sites - in 2003, web evaluators still complain that "getting lost" is the biggest problem on most internet sites - our Boer War website was the only one in the world which featured always, a single click in to the most distant corners of the Museum, from which you never had to backtrack even once. It was literally impossible to ever got lost - know where you had been or see where you were going next.
In 2003 we've had to modify that so that you now need two clicks: "One click in and one click out." (You can reach the most distant corner of our site with just one click, not four, five, or six "in", then four, five, or six back to where you started - hopefully - if you don't get lost on the way.)
"I just love your website! I spent some extra time on your site and WOW, you guys are into some really cool stuff! You seem to love life .... and that's GREAT"
Boise, IDAHO
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It was a site which placed the "surfer" in charge, not the net spun by the wily computer programmer or web master.
"Very impressive and interesting!" - Montreal, QUEBEC
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Wrote a Web site developer in 1999:
"I must say it's a most impressive accomplishment. Very few web sites anywhere can match the level of picture and informational complexity to be found in yours ."
- Toronto, ONTARIO
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Our Beacon 1999: "It is our hope that the Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum will serve as a beacon to other museums around the world, so that they too will start to turn their web sites into "educational" instead of "promotional" venues, and let the rest of us see their collections without having to pay for an entrance fee; and do it the 21st Century way - as educational modules on the internet."
The Curator, The Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum
 2003: Whereas, in 1999, even the biggest museums around the world did not have web sites displaying their collections as educational modules on the internet, in 2003, this has changed dramatically. Most museums have now abandoned their old website models, and are posting a growing number of pictorial modules displaying their museum's holdings. And in a welcome departure from past practices, they have placed in charge "content-driven" subject experts to take the leading role in creating their web sites. The computer "nerds" - once the lords of the internet - have been relegated to the background, where they can fulfill the role that their talents call for - as website technology facilitators.
Warning: The Canadian Anglo-Boer War Museum is protected by international copyright law. It is illegal to copy any part of this web site without receiving prior written permission from Goldi Productions Ltd.
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New for 2003
Also New for 2003, on pages with the Golden Reel
And now 40 of Canada's Earliest Recordings, featuring the Recording Stars of the Anglo-Boer War Era, are showcased on practically all the early pages. (.mp3 on Quicktime Player)
