McCord Stewart Discoveries

James Duncan was responsible for half of the images of Montreal published by the prestigious London magazine in the 1850s. By the mid-19^th century, advances in communications were profoundly transforming the way Montrealers interacted with the rest of the world. As a man of his time, Duncan understood this reality and put it to good use.

Presentation in French by Christian Vachon, Head, Collections Management and Curator, Documentary Art.

The McCord Stewart Museum’s Textual Archives collection is rich in personal documents, such as letters and diaries, providing an intimate window onto the emotions, sensibilities, attitudes and values of people in bygone days. The Shared Emotions project aims to make these elements, hitherto neglected by archival description and indexing conventions, more readily identifiable.

Presentation in French by Mathieu Lapointe, Curator, Archives.

In 1959, the Kul-e-Tuk parka made its debut on the Canadian market and was touted as the ultimate Canadian winter coat. Erased from the success of the Kul-e-Tuk, however, were the Inuit people from whom the style was appropriated. This talk explores the complicated history of the Kul-e-Tuk, its connection to Montreal’s garment manufacturing industry, the synthetic fibre revolution of the post-war era, winter sports, and colonial projects in the Arctic.

Presentation in English by Alexis Walker, Associate Curator, Dress, Fashion and Textiles.

A photograph of a young woman wearing her ancestor’s dress for a 1927 costume ball led to the unlikely discovery of the garment in a Laurentians cottage in 2022. Research has traced the garment from its origins in colonial Virginia in the 1760s, through the upheaval of the American Revolution, to Quebec City in 1789, embedding it in the first wave of Black emancipation.

Presentation in English by Cynthia Cooper, Head, Collections and Research; Curator, Dress, Fashion and Textiles.