Prized possessions tucked away for 33 years by the family of Port Coquitlam hometown hero Terry Fox will be part of a new exhibit at Canada's largest museum of history.
Yesterday, during a media conference at Library and Archives Canada in Burnaby - and during the first-ever Canada History Week - 16 objects that formed part of Fox's epic Marathon of Hope were unveiled for the first time. Among them:
a glass jar of water dipped in the Atlantic Ocean in St. John's, N.L., to mark the start of Fox's cross-country journey on April 12, 1980;
his Companion of the Order of Canada medal;
children's letters and cards that wish him well;
two shirts he wore on the odyssey: one reading "Terry Fox Marathon of Hope D'Espoir," the other "Marathon of Hope";
and a Team Canada jersey presented to Fox in Ontario in July 1980 by Hockey Hall of Famer Bobby Orr.
The items - along with thousands of others - will be on display in April 2015 at the future Canadian Museum of History, near Ottawa (formerly known as the Canadian Museum of Civilization) to coincide with with the 35th anniversary of the Marathon of Hope.
As well, some of the artifacts will be part of a travelling exhibition as "it represents and belongs to Canadians coast to coast," said Darrell Fox, Terry's youngest brother who also ran on the Marathon of Hope.
Included in the national exhibit will be a letter from Pauline Probyn, who was 12 when she penned a poem to Fox as part of a school project at Buckingham elementary in Burnaby. On Thursday, Probyn told reporters she couldn't remember writing the letter but was honoured her words will be part of the display.
"What his Marathon of Hope did was inspire people to pursue their dreams," said Probyn, now a New Westminster realtor.
Darrell Fox gave special thanks to Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore - the MP for Port Moody-Westwood-Port Coquitlam - for helping to preserve the artifacts. Fox's father, Rolly, said more than 150,000 items were forwarded to their home address in PoCo during the Marathon of Hope - much of which was safeguarded by the city and later transferred to the BC Sports Hall of Fame.
In March 2011, three months before Fox's mother, Betty, died, Rolly said she was ready to "let go" of her son's keepsakes and have them professionally archived.
Moore said the travelling exhibit will not only raise money for cancer research but will also collect cash to build a permanent Terry Fox Museum.
Since the Terry Fox Foundation started, it has raised more than $600 million to fight cancer, a disease the claimed the one-legged runner at the age of 22.
