The Saskatchewan Sports Hall of Fame (SSHF) was the inaugural CASH Award of Excellence for their exhibit Prairie Pride: A History of Saskatchewan Football. The CASH Award of Excellence Selection Committee was extremely impressed with the exhibit, the SSHF made excellent use of the resources available to them.

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Following an extended closure due to COVID-19 and gallery updates, they re-opened in the Fall of 2020 with this exhibit. With capacity restrictions and uncertainty surrounding the pandemic, they decided to capture the exhibit as a virtual tour and enhance it with additional content, helping fulfill their mandate to be a destination for the entire province.

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Saskatchewan Sports Hall of Fame staff on the impact of the exhibit:

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We were pleased to have a strong feature exhibit when we re-opened. Prairie Pride features some notable artifacts from our collection. This helped draw traffic to see our new Hall of Fame Gallery and the STEM Virtually Gallery sponsored by SaskTel which also opened at the same time. The virtual tour led to a notable spike in traffic to our website in its first month of availability.

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Prairie Pride launched shortly before an increase in positive COVID-19 cases locally which hindered visitation and ultimately led to our galleries temporarily closing. Being able to pivot to a virtual tour helped keep the SSHF relevant and in the public’s eye. Having a new featured exhibit has also provided crucial content for our Education Coordinator. Curriculum focused around the exhibit has been a key component of our Virtual Field Trip program that sees our Education Coordinator connect with classes or e-learning environments to offer a virtual tour.

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We have had also received strong visitor feedback on the exhibit and the virtual tour. Prairie Pride features artifacts spanning more than 100 years of history of the Saskatchewan Roughriders, but it also includes sections related to junior and university football as well as women’s football. The women’s football artifacts drew several visitors who came specifically to see them.

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Finally, because of Prairie Pride, we were asked if we would like to temporarily display the original W.G. Hardy Rugby Trophy which has been given to the Western university football champions since 1922.

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Visit their website to learn more and experience the virtual tour https://sasksportshalloffame.com/exhibits/prairie-pride-a-history-of-saskatchewan-football-celebrates/