Small
Long before the Ontario towns of Port Arthur and Fort William joined forces to become the city of Thunder Bay, the Canadian Navy had a strong presence there in the form of the Sea Cadets and the Naval Reserve Division, HMCS Griffon. This retrospective details the evolution of HMCS Griffon against the backdrop of 20th-century history and politics.
When the Canadian military created the Port Arthur Naval Division in 1937, the new entity shared quarters with the Lake Superior Regiment at the Port Arthur Armoury. In 1944, it moved into its current location on Algoma Street, which also houses HMCS Vindictive sea cadets.
The years of the Second World War were important ones in Canadian military history and the exhibition explores HMCS Griffon history during that time through interviews with veterans such as a Wren (female naval personnel), a gunner, and a torpedoman. The presentation also traces the part played by HMCS Griffon and local military in the Korean War, outlines the effects of the 1968 unification of Canada’s forces and follows dramatic changes to Navy Reserves in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It was a time when the Reserves came into their own. No longer did they serve to augment the fleet of the standing navy. Instead, they refocused and trained nationally to become Maritime Coastal Defence.
The exhibition celebrates not only HMCS Griffon’s adaptability but also its long, honourable history.
