The Glenbow Museum is an art and history regional museum in the city of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The museum focuses on Western Canadian history and culture, including Indigenous perspectives. The Glenbow was established as a private non-profit foundation in 1955 by lawyer, businessman and philanthropist Eric Lafferty Harvie with materials from his personal collection.
The museum moved to its current facility in downtown Calgary in 1976, and is funded by the governments of Calgary, Alberta, and Canada, private donors, as well as an endowment provided by Harvie. In 2019, the Glenbow had a total of 148,668 visitors. The museum closed for renovations in 2021 and is scheduled to re-open in 2027.
History
Early history
The Glenbow Museum's origin begins with Alberta lawyer and businessman Eric Lafferty Harvie. Harvie was active in the oil and gas industry in the 1920s–30s serving as director of the W. S. Herron's Okaita Oils, and solicitor for British-American Oil's operations in Turner Valley. Beginning in 1941, Harvie purchased mineral rights in the Edmonton region and leased the rights to the Imperial Oil Company which drilled Leduc No. 1, a major oil discovery. Harvie became a millionaire overnight, and after other strikes on his mineral rights in Redwater, Harvie's fortune continued to grow.
Harvie founded the Glenbow Foundation, named after Harvie's ranch and the Canadian Pacific Railway station 1.9 miles east of Cochrane, in 1955 with the goal of promoting a better understanding of the history and heritage of Western Canada, primarily through collecting and preserving art, documents and artifacts. The original goal of the organization was to collect artifacts and rely on partnerships and other museums to exhibit the collection. The foundation was headquartered in the William Roper Hull Ranche House, the former home of prominent businessman and meatpacker William Roper Hull. The early foundation consisted of a library, archives, art collection, Historical research division and the Luxton Museum in Banff, but later expanded to include photography, archaeology, ethnology and a museum division. As the Foundation, the institution funded archeological projects including that of Richard Forbis in 1958–59 at Old Women's Buffalo Jump.
Harvie sought to collect elements of Western Canadian culture and history, which were not highly sought after at the time, allowing the collection to grow quickly with donations deemed by their owners to be "junk", and low cost purchases for the foundation. The foundation's collection quickly outgrew the Hull Ranche House, and collections were moved offsite, including the archaeology division to the University of Calgary when the school founded an archaeology department. Harvie was especially interested in collecting artifacts from Indigenous peoples of North America, which was reflected in his choice of first director of the foundation Douglas Leechman. While the foundation focused on collecting Western Canadian artifacts, Harvie continued to collect artifacts that interested him from all around the world, leading to the foundation to describe two types of collections, Canadiana and Harvieana. After meeting German-American wildlife artist Carl Rungius, Harvie sought to acquire as many of his works as he could, purchasing his entire studio in Banff, and sending employees to New York to purchase any other works they could find, eventually reaching a size of 2,600 works by Rungius. Harvie used his fortune to commission works and bring artists to Alberta from across the world, including John Gilroy and Pilkington Jackson.
Creating the Glenbow–Alberta Institute
In 1964, with the assistance of the Government of Alberta, the Glenbow Foundation - Alberta Government Museum opened with the foundation supplying the exhibits, personnel and expertise, and the Government of Alberta providing the old Calgary courthouse and maintenance costs. The courthouse was found to be too small for the foundation and the exhibits, so later in 1965 the archives and library portion of the foundation moved to the Calgary Public Library Building.
The next major milestone occurred in 1966, when Harvie, who had been experiencing health issues, donated his collection to the people of Alberta as a centennial gift. The gift was finalized when the Legislative Assembly of Alberta passed An Act to Establish the Glenbow–Alberta Institute on April 15, 1966. The new institute was operated with a volunteer board, with one-third of the board appointed by the Government of Alberta, one-third by the Devonian Foundation, and one-third elected by members of the institute. The institute was initially funded by matching $5 million donations from Harvie and the Alberta government. On March 15, 1973, the institute was vested with the responsibility of being the City of Calgary's archivists, and all records no longer required in normal civic operations were to be made available and held by the institute.
In 1973, plans were finalized for the Glenbow to construct a new million facility to hold the institute's growing collection. An eight-story, structure was built by the Government of Alberta across from the Calgary Tower. The building was completed and opened to the public on September 22, 1976.
During the 1980s as the price of oil dropped, the Glenbow Museum came under significant financial pressure. In 1983, the museum noted it had a $400,000 deficit and noted the museum would close in Summer 1983 if it was unable to raising the funds. Since the opening of the new building in 1976, the organization had outspent its annual endowment creating the shortfall, and lower corporate donations with the economic downturn further reduced operating funds. The Government of Alberta provided a one time grant of $150,000 to keep the library and archives open, and Albertans donated over $240,000 within a month, but the total was still short of what was necessary for the continued operation of the museum at the same level of service.
Modern history
As of 2025, the president and CEO is Nicholas R. Bell. Former presidents and CEOs include Mike Robinson and Jeff Spalding.
In 2021, the Glenbow Museum secured a total of $94 million from government sources including $40 million from each of the Government of Canada and Alberta, and $14 million from the City of Calgary to redesign and renovate the eight-story downtown space. The museum will seek an additional $40 million from private sources for the renovation. The project is set to total $115 million for capital costs, and remaining funds going towards operational costs and future programs., while providing exhibits through satellite sites.
Admission to the museum is free permanently as of February 2022, due to a $25 million donation by the Shaw Family Foundation. $15 million of the donation will be placed in an endowment fund for admissions, and $10 million is earmarked for the new JR Shaw Institute for Canadian Art, named in honor of JR Shaw, founder of Shaw Communications and Corus Entertainment. The collection includes important holdings of Albertan pottery, Western Canadian folk studies, northern explorations, numismatics, pressed glass, and textiles. The museum sorts its Community History collection in the following manner, Community and Ceremonial Life, Daily Life, Ethnic Cultures, Leisure and Play, and Work and Industry.
Military and Mounted Police
The Military and Mounted Police collection includes an extensive collection of artifacts relating to Canadian military history, with an emphasis on southern Alberta. In addition, the museum's collection also includes a number of European and Japanese armour, arms, and firearms and other weapons from around the world. The Military and Mounted Police collection has been sorted into the following categories, Arms and Armour, Canada at War, Famous People and Battles, Firearms, and Mounted Police. The collection sorted under Canada at War primarily focuses on the role of Canada, and Alberta, during the North-West Rebellion, World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. The Mounted Police section includes a number of artifacts relating to the development of the North-West Mounted Police, and its successor, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
The Glenbow's military collection is the most diverse in Western Canada, with 26,000 items. This includes 2,100 firearms, ranging from the 16th century to present day, in the Firearms section of the Military and Mounted Police collection. Most of the artifacts from the museum's Famous People and Battles section were artifacts acquired from the Royal United Services Institute. In June 2008, the Glenbow Museum and the University of Alberta acquired a number of artifacts from Sam Steele, an officer of the North-West Mounted Police, and the commanding officer of the Strathcona's Horse in the Boer War. 60 objects from the Sam Steele collection are on display at the Glenbow Museum.
The Plains section places a particular emphasis on the indigenous peoples of the northwestern Plains, including the Anishinaabe, the Niitsitapi, Cree, and Tsuut'ina Nation. The Northwest Coast section of the Native North America collection focuses on the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, most notably the Kwakwaka'wakw, and the Nuu-chah-nulth. The Other First Peoples section includes artifacts from other Canadian First Nations groups, including the Dene, Iroqouis, and Mi'kmaq.
The Glenbow ethnology collection contains approximately 48,000 items. Niitsitapiisinni: Our Way of Life, a permanent exhibit centred around the Niitsitapi, features a number of items from the museum's Native North America collection. The museum's African collection contains over 5,000 artifacts, most of which was acquired in the 1960s. The collection has a particular focus on West Africa, with a number of artifacts from the Akan, Bamileke, Yoruba, and the Kingdom of Bamum. The museum's Latin American collection was also acquired in the 1960s. Its collection primarily focuses on the Amazon Basin, with artifacts from the Bororo, Karajá, Tapirapé, and Urubu peoples. The museum's Oceania collection is primarily made up of artifacts from Papua New Guinea, although the collection also includes artifacts from areas throughout Oceania.
"Many Faces, Many Paths: Art of Asia" houses more than 80 statues, sculptures and other Buddhist and Hindu relics dating as far back as the first century. The Bumper Development Corporation Ltd., a private oil and gas company headquartered in Calgary, donated nearly all the pieces in this gallery, which is the museum's oldest exhibit. The Asian collection consists of Buddhist and Hindu art from Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Nepal, Pakistan, Thailand, and Tibet.
Where Symbols Meet: A Celebration of West African Achievement, is a permanent exhibition at Glenbow, featuring a number of items from the museum's West African collection.