Canadian War Museum
The old Canadian War Museum building on Sussex Drive
The new Canadian War Museum, under construction at Lebreton Flats
The museum is currently located on Sussex Drive next to the Royal Canadian Mint and the National Gallery of Canada. Its current location is quite small and much of the Museum's collection is stored at a west-end warehouse known as Vimy House, which used to be Ottawa's streetcar garage.
Because of the limited size of the existing location, a new building is under construction at Lebreton Flats just west of Parliament Hill to replace the old building that will permanently close to the public on September 6, 2004. It will be far more modern and will be large enough to allow the museum to display more of its artifacts. The new Museum will open on LeBreton Flats in May 2005. Its architecture was designed to mimic a bunker, and the small and large windows on the part of the roof that spikes up spell out Lest we forget and N'oublions jamais (the French equivalent) in Morse code.
The Canadian War Museum has a large collection with artifacts from early colonial times up to the Gulf War and Peacekeeping. Perhaps the Museum's most famous possession is Hitler's personal Mercedes limousine. The Museum also has a very extensive collection of war art.
The museum is part of the Museum of Civilization Corporation, which also runs the Canadian Museum of Civilization, the Canadian Children's museum and the Canadian Postal Museum.
The three most recent heads of the War Museum are:
- Victor Suthren 1986-1998
- Jack Granatstein 1998-2001
- Joe Geurts 2001-