One Man's History in Wood: the John McCrea Collection

One Man's History in Wood: the John McCrea Collection

Olde Jail Museum 2009

Between 1937 and 1957, the last 20 years of his life, artisan John McNeely McCrea reproduced finely detailed models of the furnishings, homes and buildings used by Ontario pioneers. This exhibit, put on by the cultural division of the Museums and Heritage Services of the City of Toronto, showcases a large portion of the total collection of McCrea’s work, which was formerly held by the Royal Ontario Museum. Each duplicate, whether it takes the form of a tiny flycatcher on a mantle or a large grist mill, is true to the original and a testimony to the permanent legacy McCrea left behind of pioneer Ontario’s “wooden age.”