BATTLEFORD — Saskatchewan residents stepped up their game recently, helping to save the province's only Baseball Museum and Hall of Fame as financial struggles loomed in 2024.
Jane Shury, the museum's CEO, told SASKTODAY.ca at an open house on Feb. 8 that it was the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic causing donations and membership renewals to decline.
"COVID-19 came along, and as it hit everybody else, it hit us very hard. Because a lot of our members and people that came here to visit and what have you didn't happen. That was a real downfall," she said.
"And it's been a real climb to get back up to where we were, so we decided we would have a membership drive," Shury added.
Following that call for donations and memberships, Shury said that the museum is now barrelling full steam ahead to their annual induction ceremony in August, with the deadline for applications closing on March 15.
"We have been overwhelmed with the response, first of all from our members who are [from] across the province, as well as a lot of new people who heard about it ... and they've come through."
"It's heartwarming. It's been very, very successful."
Some of the success, Shury says, was due to Saskatchewan's long history with baseball, going back as far as the late 1870s.
The museum has been part of the Battlefords since 1983. Located in Battleford, the museum has been in operation since 1983 and has memorabilia including uniforms, photographs, baseball bats, baseballs, equipment, trophies and more.
"The idea of this place was to be able to show this memorabilia and that's all collected a lot of it from those people that have been inducted whether it be an individual, or a team, or a member of the community," Shury said.
The museum has inducted 570 individuals, 44 teams, 31 communities and 22 families in the last 38 inductions.
And now, with a longer list of members, Shury hopes that people continue to pay their membership each year which is $25 for a year, or $200 for a lifetime.
"The [museum is the] only organization with the history of baseball being researched very thoroughly, written and recorded. That is something that was something very important in the settling and development of Saskatchewan," she said.
"It's very important, we cannot let all that work that was done [be left] ... we just have to keep moving forward.
With files from Sherri Solomko
