Manitoba Historical Society app puts past at fingertips

Curious about a historic building in Manitoba? There’s now an app for that.

The Manitoba Historical Society launched its free MHS InSite app on Friday. It details info on more than 10,000 sites across the province; 2,687 of those locations are in Winnipeg.

Available for Android and iPhone devices, it has an interactive map that shows which sites are close to a user’s location, directions to them and a search function to discover more info on a building or monument.

“It’s a really intriguing way to see what’s around you, what you may not have been aware of and then to really dig deeper into the context and history of a site,” said Tracey Turner, executive director for the Manitoba Historical Society.

“It’s a groundbreaking innovation for us to connect all of our historical knowledge stored on our database for everyday users to discover.”

Turner said the app has been in development for nearly two years and relied on a provincial grant of less the $10,000.

Kyle Tichon of Tichon Technologies approached the society with the concept and then continued developing it after funding was secured, she added. The society’s decades-old database of research has never before been accessible in “the palm of your hand.”

Turner said she hopes the new app will show people how many historical sites they pass by without knowing the story behind them. It will also improve the info available for tourists when navigating and choosing which sites to see, she said.

The app’s launch coincides with the kickoff of Historic Places Days, a week-long celebration of historic sites across Canada hosted by the National Trust for Canada. The charity funds and protects heritage locations.

Christian Cassidy, local history buff and monthly columnist for the Free Press Community Review, applauded the new app.

“The days of printed walking tour books or driving guides are sadly behind us,” he said. “If you want to bring this information to people, an app is the way to go,”

Cassidy offers walking tours of historic sites in Winnipeg and said he’s seen an uptick in people wanting to learn more about the city’s history. Having even more information available is an important step to teach people about Manitoba’s history and help preserve buildings, he added.

“So much of historical preservation comes after a building has burned down or after a demolition permit has been taken out, then suddenly everybody has all this interest in a building’

If people are educated on a site’s importance to a neighbourhood before it gets to the point where it might be destroyed, then it might alert others to fund and maintain the buildings, Cassidy said.

“You get beyond that 10 per cent history that always gets talked about and (in the app) you can really drill down into the history of buildings, people and places.”

matthew.frank@freepress.mb.ca