On Location
Book us for an on location experience in the City of Waterloo with your class. Our staff will use the Ontario curriculum to guide your class through some of the city's historic sites.
Walking tours are approximately 2 hours in length and terrain is sometimes uneven and rough, so travel friendly shoes are recommended.
Fee: $130 per tour.
Max: 30 students.
At Mount Hope Cemetery
Join Museum staff at Mount Hope Cemetery for a guided tour of Waterloo’s oldest community cemetery. In 1865, the councils of Waterloo and Berlin (Kitchener) decided to form a joint committee to investigate having a large community cemetery overlap between the two municipalities. A year later in September 1866, Waterloo decided to act on its own and purchased seven acres of land from the Village Reeve and Chairman of the Cemetery Committee, John Hoffman. An additional acre of land was donated by Hoffman to be used as a Free Cemetery. The cemetery opened on January 14, 1867 after the council of Waterloo passed by law 25 which set out the regulations for use; officially creating Mount Hope Cemetery.
These tours are a great way to engage high school and university students in historical themes. They take global topics and apply a local point of view to each one. Themed walks include:
| Dealers in Death |
| Often a topic left out of history, this tour explores some of the less talked about aspects of life. From coroners and undertakers to distillers and cigar-makers, these individuals – either directly or indirectly – dealt in death throughout the history of Waterloo. |
| J. E. Seagram and Company |
| In this tour we will look not only at the namesake for the distillery but at the many other jobs which were connected to the industry. This tour acts as a case study of the connectivity of early industries and communities. |
| Mayors, Movers and Shakers |
| This tour looks at first hand stories of how early settler established towns and villages in what today we call Canada. New villages were being created across the country and in this tour we will look at Waterloo’s formation as a case study in history. |
| More than Wives and Daughters |
| Women have traditionally been left out of history and through this tour we bring them to the forefront. We explore their stories and discuss the society in which they lived and how it limited their opportunity. |
| The Ultimate Sacrifice, War Stories from Mount Hope Cemetery |
| The realities of the World Wars can often get lost in facts and figures from history, but this tour takes the time to add names and faces to the numbers. Here we explore soldiers, nurses and their family’s experiences from war through both primary and secondary sources. |