Students take historic walks through downtown Winnipeg

After a long and confining winter, some tour guides want to put some historic spring into your students’ steps.

“For such a young city, Winnipeg has a unique and fascinating history that not a lot of people know about,” says Kristen Verin-Treusch, founder of Muddy Waters Tours.

Inspired by a trip to Scotland and her history background, Verin-Treusch began offering historical tours around Winnipeg seven years ago.

“I did some great tours while I was traveling, and when I came back, I wondered why somebody wasn’t doing something similar in Winnipeg,” she says.

Today, Muddy Waters operates several themed tours around the city. Murder, Mystery and Mayhem is the oldest and most popular, directed by a costumed guide who plays a “victim of the gallows”. Leading guests through tales of ghosts, murders and monsters, the tour winds through Winnipeg’s shadowy past, including the Vaughan Street jail, built in 1881. The oldest and last remaining building from that year, the jail is a concrete fortress that housed men, women and even a five-year-old criminal.

The Boom and Bust of Winnipeg tour showcases the city’s political past, particularly Louis Riel, immigration and the Winnipeg General Strike.  

”Massively significant things took place in Winnipeg,” says Verin-Treusch. “The Suffrage movement was huge, and the right to vote for women happened right here in Winnipeg.” 

The newest tour this year is the Pestilence, Shamans, and Doctors tour, led by a famous Victorian lady doctor.  Students can get a chance to hear stories of medicine in the past, find medicinal herbs and take the “medical exam” during the tour to win edible prizes.

The tours are interactive and engage kids with props and audience participation. All the tours can be customized for a specific age group, time constraint, or content – depending on what a school wants to do. Muddy Waters also offers classroom presentations throughout the year, and the walking tours usually begin the first week of May.

“We’ve had excellent response from schools,” says Verin Treusch. “Several schools have returned time and time again. The kids ask some great questions. If I can get them excited about history, that’s good enough for me.”

For more information or to book a tour, call 204-997-TOUR, or visit http://www.muddywatertours.ca/

Architecture, power, heroes all part of Exchange tour

For some great architecture and fascinating stories of power, corruption and heroism, there is the Exchange District tour.

The Exchange District Biz offers walking tours of the 20-some blocks in the heart of Winnipeg, all departing from Old Market Square. Exploring the “Chicago of the North” the tours delve into the fascinating past of the city, while learning about the most historically intact commercial district on the continent.

The BIZ tours are designed to fit directly with provincial social studies curricula for Grades 6 to 12, and explore the growth and development of Winnipeg, and the importance of rail travel, unions and prosperity at the turn of the twentieth century.

Specialty themed tours include Banker’s Row – which visits nine remaining bank buildings in the area; the Winnipeg Grain Exchange – which explored the history of the Grain Exchange association; and the Theatre District tour which showcases Winnipeg’s art scene that dates back to the early 1900s.

“A lot of schools do a west Exchange tour with different highlights from the specialty tours,” says Matthew Komus, the tour co-ordinator for the Exchange District Biz.

“A particular stop that kids enjoy is Ma’s Garage, one of the first car garages in the city. They also get to learn about the Newspaper Row, and how if they were living here a hundred years ago, they could be selling newspapers on the streets to make a living.”

Because of its historical and interesting architecture, The Exchange District has also been the backdrop for a number of movies, including Shall We Dance, and the more recent Brad Pitt flick, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. 

“People like to see where the movies have been shot, so we include that in our tour as well,” says Komus.

The BIZ tours accommodate large parties, and the tours can be tailored to different age groups. A new tour for 2008 is the Green Building and Sustainable Land Uses tour, which explores the ‘green’ architecture of the exchange and teaches audiences about sustainable city planning and energy conservation.

“It’s surprising how many kids haven’t really been downtown, even in high school,” he says. “We want to show them what the Exchange has to offer. For older students especially, there are coffee shops, cool stores and lots to do around here.”

The BIZ tours have started up for the season. For more information, or to book a tour visit http://www.exchangedistrict.org/WalkingTours.aspx or call 942-6716.