Museums & Archives
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New Westminster’s Museums & Archives are managed across three city locations: Anvil Centre, Irving House and the Samson V Museum. The operations care for over 36,000 objects, 50,000 photographs, and 500 linear meters of archival records that celebrate and document our city’s history. Our exhibits focus on the land, people, and development of the place now known as New Westminster. We aspire to be fun and entertaining places of learning and use the objects in the museum’s collection as an entry-point to inquiry, discussion, and exploration about the city.
Mission
The New Westminster Museum and Archives strive to enhance knowledge and deepen understanding of the City and its diverse peoples by illuminating past events, exploring current issues and facilitating conversations around future possibilities.
Mandate
The New Westminster Museum and Archives will:
- collect, preserve and house the objects, archival materials, natural history specimens and collective memories that best serve to illustrate the first peoples, environment, founding, settlement, relationships and development of the New Westminster area;
- research, make available, interpret and exhibit its collections for the use and benefit of the public;
- engage with all peoples and organisations that can inform and support the narratives of the New Westminster area.
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Museum Contact Archives Contact
T 604-527-4640 T 604-527-4640
The New Westminster Museum and Archives gratefully acknowledge the financial assistance of the Province of British Columbia
The museum consists of three galleries. The permanent gallery at Anvil Centre takes you on a journey of discovery, covering over 10,000 years of New Westminster history and ending in 2010.
Gallery 7 picks up where the permanent gallery leaves off. This is a place of engagement and interaction, bringing forth the contemporary stories of our city through discussion, dialogue, and exhibition in a smaller intimate setting. The temporary gallery lets us take a deeper look into many of our city’s more interesting and thought-provoking stories, individuals, and objects.
The third gallery can be found at 1865 Irving House, the former colonial home of Captain William Irving, and one of the oldest community heritage sites in B.C.
Tour Bookings
Duration: 60 mins.Fee: $170.00 (GST included)
30 participants max.Enquiries to the collections
All museum collections are held in trust for the community. Should you have an interest in viewing an item in our collection that is not on display in the galleries, please contact us to book an appointment with our staff.
SOLIDARITY FOREVER
New Westminster was built on a foundation of organized union labour. By delving into what drove people to join together and what they stood up against, we can learn so much about the working conditions of the past, as well as what fights have continued to this day. This exhibition serves as a reminder that rights were not freely given by following the stories of those who demanded change.Opens February 14, 2026
New Westminster Museum Feature Gallery | 777 Columbia St.REFRAMED: UNDERSTANDING NEW WEST THROUGH PHOTOS
Pictured: A school class photograph from John Robson School, c. 1900. IHP0042.New Westminster Museum and Archives holds 230,000 photographs documenting scenes from the city’s history and its people. By critically examining photographs, both familiar and unseen, we can better understand the role photographs may play in creating a more genuine picture of New Westminster’s history. We can look again and reframe our knowledge about the city by highlighting its marginalized stories.
This exhibition is part of the 2025 Capture Photography Festival Selected Exhibition Program.
Archives Reading Room and Research Inquiries available by appointment. Please e-mail
The New Westminster Archives acquires, preserves, and makes accessible records that tell our story. The archives is home to a documentary heritage that documents New Westminster’s evolution from British Columbia’s first fledgling capital to a bustling 21st century city. Preserved for present and future generations are over 150 years of archival records that document local organizations, businesses, government, families, and individuals. Here you’ll find photographs, maps, plans, diaries, letters, city records, and oral histories. In the reading room there are reference files on people, properties, and subjects all related to the City of New Westminster.
If you have questions about your family’s history, residence, the development of your neighbourhood, the history of a New Westminster business, or about the administration of the local government, the New Westminster Museum and Archives is the place to discover your heritage.
Archives Online Database
Click here to access our Archives Online database. Search over 90,000 Archival records using easy keyword searches. Email links, post images to your social media site or comment on records to our Archivist.
T: 604-527-4640
E: archives@newwestcity.ca
Reproductions of Archival Material
The New Westminster Archives does not require formal permission to publish or license material available on our online database.
It is the responsibility of patrons to follow any applicable laws governing the use of records, including, but not limited to, Canadian copyright legislation.
We offer digital reproductions of our materials for a fee. Most scanned images and audio visual materials my be requested for a fee $16.90 per item.
Photocopies of textual materials are available for a fee of $.60 per page and will be provided through email as a PDF.
Note: some circumstances may prohibit reproductions such as if the material is too large or too fragile.
When requesting a reproduction, indicate the body of your email the record id number, intended use of the reproduction, a phone number you where you may be reached, any special instructions.
After receiving your email we will contact you to review your order.
Payment through debit or credit is required before your order is filled. Credit cards accepted are VISA and Mastercard.
Materials are delivered as downloadable files through a link sent to you by email. Most orders are completed within 7 to 10 days.
Samson V, launched in 1937, is the last surviving wooden steam-powered sternwheeler built for the federal Department of Public Works for use as a snag-boat on the Fraser River. At 418 gross tons and 115’ on deck, she was the fifth in a series of similar vessels dating back to 1884 that cleared debris, maintained aids to navigation and government docks, performed surveys and served other functions as needed.
Samson V was the last steam-powered sternwheeler to operate in Canada and representative of a of the federal government’s long-standing involvement in maintaining the waterways of western Canada. The Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada has declared the operation of sternwheeler snag-boats by the Department of Public works on the rivers of British Columbia an event of national historic significance and in the future intends to commemorate this by means of a plaque installed on or near Samson V, “the last representative example” of these vessels.
Samson V was retired in 1980 and sold to the City of New Westminster for one dollar on the understanding that the vessel would be preserved as a museum and that it occupy a unique place in the Province’s and City’s maritime heritage. Samson V remains the only completely intact and floating wooden sternwheeler in North America.
Restorations
Click here to watch a video by our friends at Favourite Boatworks to learn more about Samson V and see the extensive restoration work done on board during the summer of 2024.
Downstream Where the Waters Mix
May 24 - December 15, 2025
Curated by lead visionary artist, Nadine Spence, the project connects artists and Indigenous communities across B.C. through culture, arts and ceremony to restore relationships between generations with the water, lands and wild salmon. Featuring bentwood chests and boxes, woven blankets, carving, art, and regalia, this exhibition focuses on personal, family, and community healing journeys in a safe and respectful space that does not oppress the truth and realities of Indigenous Peoples of the past or in the present day.
Housing Values
February 20 - April 2024
Housing is the hottest topic around these days. Everywhere you turn, people are talking about housing but it’s not a new concern. How much, where and what people live in has been debated since New Westminster was founded in 1861. Housing Values is a new exhibit presented by the New Westminster Museum & Archives, examining ideas around housing in New Westminster and how cultural values, economics and history influence where and how we live in this city. The exhibit opens in October in honour of the United Nations’ World Habitat Day.
Reconciling
February 16, 2022 – September 2023
Through three installations, Reconciling addresses truths attached to acts of reconciliation. Haida/Nisga’a artist Luke Parnell explores a feeling of disenchantment through his piece Neon Reconciliation Explosion; the downed statue of Judge Begbie addresses the imposition of foreign laws on a land; and the 215 shoes placed at New Westminster’s cenotaph reflects our community’s response to the Residential School legacy in Canada.
Celebrating Black History in Canada through Tessellation and Portraiture
Moved by a push for greater social justice, New Westminster Secondary School Art students researched prominent figures from Black History in Canada and share their contributions in black and white tessellation patterns and portraits. Equal parts black and white, these works challenge a Eurocentric-lens that is too often applied when discussing history by featuring People of Colour and Black Canadians in an equally starring role. Each student provides a thoughtful artist statement with their portrait.
This exhibition replicates the original class work, design, and display.
The 215
November 25 - December 5, 2021Johnny Bandura is a Coast Salish artist who has created a series of 215 portraits that were inspired by his own family. His paternal Grandmother, Marie, was born in New Westminster and as a very young girl, she was taken from her home and family and sent to the Kamloops Indian Residential School in the 1930s.In May 2021, when the news reported that the skeletal remains of 215 children were discovered on the grounds of the Kamloops Residential School, Johnny recognized that many of these lost 215 children could well have been his grandmother’s classmates and friends and he felt a very strong need to do something to honour these children.He imagined lives for them that reflected all areas of society. He created an exhibit to show what they could have become.
Air Hugs
March 31 – September 5, 2021
A new exhibit on the community’s resilience during the pandemic.
You Are What You Eat: Community Food Security
May 16 - December 1, 2019
Stories from the past and present in New Westminster to help us understand how people eat in our community.
Getting the Word Out
October 25 - April 28, 2019
From the first cumbersome printing press dragged over the stumps and hills of the budding city, this exhibit shows New Westminster’s past of fake news, clickbait and alternative facts.
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Our Living Languages: First Peoples' Voices in BC
May 28 - July 29, 2021
The Heat Is On: Keeping Warm Then, Keeping Cool Now
November 7, 2019 - May 2, 2021
An Ocean of Peace: 100 Years of Sikhs in New Westminster
ਸੁੱਖ ਸਾਗਰ: ਨਿਊ ਵੈਸਟਮਿਨਸਟਰ ਦੇ ਸਿੱਖਾਂ ਦੇ ਪਿਛਲੇ ੧੦੦ ਸਾਲ ਦਾ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ
January 24 - December 23, 2020.jpg)
The Long Hours: Art in the BC Penitentiary
August 2018 - July 2019
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People Gotta Move
July 5 - November 16, 2018
Be/Longing
February 17 - October 7, 2018
Bottoms Up:
The Cultures of Drink in the Royal CityNovember 4, 2017 – May 27, 2018 
Planning New West:
A History and Future of Urban Development in New WestminsterJune 1, 2017 – January 21, 2017
Witness Blanket
December 5, 2016 - April 28, 2017
Ornamenting the Ordinary: Crafts of South Asia
September 10, 2016 – January 2, 2017
Branching Out: Plants in New Westminster's History
June 2 – November 20, 2016
The Living Archive
June 23 - August 21, 2016
Architectural Gems in the Royal City
September 17, 2015 - May 8, 2016
Our Working Waterfront, 1945-2015
July 9 - October 27, 2015
Hair Apparent: A Hairy History of New Westminster
April 23 - June 21, 2015
Baskets for Barter
November 29, 2014 - January 24, 2015
Wait for Me, Daddy
October 4, 2014 - August 16, 2015
