The extent of damage from a fire at the Museum of the Highwood in High River is still being determined as staff and volunteers sift through the building to determine what was lost.

Firefighters and volunteers sort through the artifacts saved from a fire at the Museum of the Highwood in High River on July 28.

The fire was first reported at 4 a.m. on July 28 and took firefighters several hours to extinguish.

The museum’s collection, which includes artifacts and photographs of foothills’ ranching heritage, is being moved into trailers until it can be moved back into the museum.

“We’re getting a conservator to come in and help us figure out what to do about that,” said museum director Irene Kerr.

Although most of the museum’s collection was saved, it was a difficult blaze to handle. At one point when crews thought they were getting the upper hand with the blaze, it took off again.

“We initially thought we had it under control by about six this morning,” said High River fire chief Len Zebedee. “Unfortunately, it flared up again in the attic. It took us another two hours to get it under control.”

Zebedee said the fire is still under investigation.

There is nothing suspicious about the fire, he said, and they have not yet determined how the fire began.

However, Zebedee has pinpointed the site where the fire started on the outside of the building at the southeast corner.

He said the fire caused extensive damage to the roof and attic, but the main floor suffered only water and smoke damage. He estimated the majority of items in the building should be salvageable.

Zebedee hasn’t yet determined a value for the fire damage.

“I don’t know how you’d put a price and dollar value on the objects in there,” he said.

Firefighters from High River, Blackie and Okotoks were called out to the fire.

Okotoks fire chief Ken Thevenot said they received the call to respond around 4 a.m. when the fire was first reported. Four Okotoks firefighters responded with a ladder truck while other off-duty firefighters were called in to man the station

Damage to the museum’s collection is still being determined, but Museum photo archivist Bill Holmes said most of the clothing in the museum’s collection is located in the area around where the fire occurred.

A fire caused significant damage to the foor and attic of the Museum of the Highwood in High River on July 28. The cause of the blaze is still under investigation and while damage to the museum's collection appears limited, officials are still combing through tha artifacts.

“It’s uniforms and things like that are pretty valuable as far as the history in the area,” he said.

Holmes said the fire department removed some items from the museum, including photos, saddles and old ledger books belonging to the Town and some computers.

He said he is relieved some photos were saved. He said there was no fire damage in the photo vault, but he still has to wait to see if there is any smoke damage.

“From the pictures they were bringing out it looked like they were in fairly good shape,” said Holmes.

He said about half of the museum’s collection, in terms of volume, is stored off-site.

However, the museum does not have much in terms of fireproof storage for its antiquities.

The building has a fire alarm system, which alerted the fire department, but the museum doesn’t have any fire-safe storage areas. The museum’s photo archives are stored in a vault, but it is not fire proof.

Many artifacts at the museum are a historic record of the foothills and Highwood region and the items are irreplaceable.

“Most of our collection is from High River and from Longview to Blackie and Cayley to the Gladys Ridge area,” Kerr said. “Most of our artifacts are from ranching and all that.”

Okotoks community services manager Susan Laurin said Okotoks is willing to assist the Museum of the Highwood as it recovers from the fire.

“It’s just a shame that it would happen to the museum in High River and the Town of Okotoks will work in cooperation with High River in whatever way that we can if the museum needed some help,” she said.

Laurin said protection of Okotoks’ archives and museum collection is a top priority and it’s something the Town continues to monitor.

“We are always conscientious of safety and record retention of all of our documents,” she said. “It’s something we always consider.”

The Town’s museum and archives are held in the Heritage House, located next to the Okotoks Art Gallery at the Station.

The Town has an early-detection alarm system in place with multiple monitoring stations throughout the building and it is tested regularly.

“It’s so we will get early notification if something was to happen in the middle of the night with no staff present,” said Laurin.

She said they don’t store any flammable liquids or chemicals on site.

However, there are no fire-safe storage areas in the building.

Laurin said it’s a 100-year-old house, which makes it difficult to make significant renovations to fire proof the building.

“It’s a wooden structure that we wouldn’t be able to change to steel because then you lose the character of the house,” she said.

The Town is in the process of creating digital versions of all items in its archives and it’s currently about halfway complete. All digital records will be stored on the Town’s server at a different location.

Laurin said some items are stored off-site, but most of the museum’s collection is stored in the building’s basement.

She said they also store any items that could be damaged by pests, such as moths, in a freezer.

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