Staff
Jillian Metcalfe grew up in Inkerman, Ontario and has been volunteering, training and working as a cultural and heritage professional since 2009. In 2011, she graduated with a BA, major in history from Carleton University. In 2014, she graduated with Honours from the Applied Museum Studies program at Algonquin College. In 2014, she was presented with the Ontario Museum Association Award of Merit. Growing up in a rural community, she took interest in local history at a young age. She joined the Chesterville & District Historical Society in 2009 and was President from 2015-2018. In this role, she oversaw and was involved in fundraising and events, grant applications, collections management and exhibit development. She has worked for the City of Ottawa Museums and Archives, where the positions were primarily focused on educational and public programming. She also has experience in gilt, built heritage, paper conservation and artifact reproductions through an internship with Parks Canada. Most recently, she worked as an HR advisor for Polar Knowledge Canada, a crown corporation within the Government of Canada.
Ann Robinson grew up near Metcalfe on a farm on Bank Street, and now resides in Marvelville with her family. She worked for the Land Registry Office for 20 years serving the public as a clerk, dealing with land registration documents. She was hired on to do data entry at the museum in 2007 and has since become [artefact herself] (haha!) the full time administrative and exhibit officer for the museum.
Caitlyn McDougall grew up in historic Bowmanville, Ontario where she took an interest in history from a young age. She completed her BFA at OCAD University in Toronto in 2013 where she focused on art education during her internship at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Since moving to Kemptville, she has worked as Programming Coordinator for Ottawa Summer Solstice and most recently Programming Officer at the Goulbourn Museum.
Patrick Chisholm grew up in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario (the Soo) and has been training and working as a cultural and heritage professional since 2015. In 2018, he graduated with Honours from the Applied Museum Studies program at Algonquin College. He now has over 4 years of on-the-job experience working with collections in cultural institutions including museums, archives and gallery settings. Patrick has worked in various roles for the following institutions: Collections Officer with Goulbourn Museum, Archival Intern with Ingenium – Canada’s Science and Technology Museum, Technical Services Intern with the National Gallery of Canada, Archival and Museum Collections Assistant with the City of Ottawa Archives, and Contractor with the Canadian Museum of History. Each institution offered invaluable opportunities to work in the field and to handle a variety of different artefacts, records, and objects.
Museums create memories and inspire curiosity. Patrick first remembers being inspired by the museum world in the Soo when he visited the Old Stone Heritage
House, a.k.a. the Ermatinger Clergue National Historic Site. The site depicts the lives of early settlers and provides interaction with costumed interpreters as they
performed every-day traditional tasks. He also has fond memories of visiting the Canadian Bushplane Heritage Center (also in the Soo) which offers visitors a tour of a warehouse hanger full of their collection of airplanes. He remembers climbing into the cockpit and how that memory had a profound impact on him. His own personal experiences with museums demonstrate the importance of community institutions and the long-lasting impression that a museum can have on its visitors.
