HOW DID THEY GET THE NONSUCH INSIDE THE MANITOBA MUSEUM?

As the replica of the Nonsuch in the Manitoba Museum sits bone-dry on a painted floor, you’d never know the ship braved the ocean to make its debut in Winnipeg. In 1968, J. Hinks & Son built the replica in Appledore, England, marking the 300th anniversary of the original’s creation.

The replica ship sailed from England, survived a North Atlantic gale, and reached Canada in 1970. It then sailed up the St. Lawrence River and when it hit land, it had external pieces removed, was placed on sets of wheels and was then hauled by a group of trucks. The ship sailed on each Great Lake and visited British Columbia before coming back to Manitoba.

 In November 1973, the ship arrived in Winnipeg and was maneuvered into its gallery by a heavy-lift crane. The rest of the gallery was then built around the ship, which was unveiled on Dec. 8, 1974.

HOW DID THEY GET THE GOLDEN BOY DOWN FROM THE LEGISLATIVE BUILDING?

When the Golden Boy got a makeover in 2002, few people heard how hard it was to get him down from the Legislative Building. After two years of researching and planning how to restore the Boy and get him safely to the ground, Alpha Masonry spent three days loosening his bolts, then used an aluminum and wooden lifting cage they’d constructed so no weight would be put on the statue’s hollow structure. Having been 77 metres in the air since 1919, the 17-foot-tall, 3,640-pound Golden Boy touched foot on the ground again on February 9, 2002.

 Once he was restored, the Golden Boy was put on display in a climate-controlled enclosure in the middle of The Forks, where he was re-covered with 23.75-karat gold leaf while the public watched. When he returned to the dome on top of the Legislative Building that September, he’d spent 208 days on the ground.

HOW DID THEY MAKE THE SNAKES FOR THE NARCISSE SNAKE PIT DIORAMA?

Their striped oily skin, big black eyes and thin muscular bodies almost convince you they’re real. And in a way, these garter snakes are. The reptiles in the Narcisse snake pits diorama at the Manitoba Museum were crafted using molds of different snakes found in the pits at Narcisse.

They’re made of a pliable plastic that twists and bends before it hardens, which is why the snakes look so real as they crawl across their plastic rocks and coloured sawdust lichens. The moss, bushes and bottom layer of rocks are the only natural items in the diorama, and were taken with permission from the Narcisse area. The presentation, which features red-sided and western plains garter snakes, encourages visitors to go to the Narcisse snake pits. After three years of preparation, the diorama was unveiled as part of the Museum’s Parklands gallery in 2003.

Manitoba Museum, 190 Rupert Avenue, 956-2830,
www.manitobamuseum.ca .

HOW DID THEY GET THE TRAIN INSIDE THE MANITOBA CHILDREN'S MUSEUM?

At the Manitoba Children’s Museum (MCM), imaginations run wild as kids pretend they’re conducting the train as they drive through an endless tunnel in the museum. But little do they know that their daydream isn’t far from the truth. The 1952 diesel locomotive and 1910 passenger coach that make up the museum’s All Aboard gallery were in fact driven right into the museum in 1993.

“We’re located in the oldest surviving train repair building in Western Canada,” says Lisa Walli, MCM’s director of marketing and communications.

The locomotive, one of 30 built by General Motors, is permanently placed on an original train repair table in the gallery. Retired in 1989, the locomotive spent four years in a train yard before volunteers repainted it with its original colours and moved it to The Forks, where it joined forces with the passenger coach donated by Prairie Dog Central Railway.

Manitoba Children’s Museum, 45 Forks Market Road, 924-4000,
www.childrensmuseum.com .