Bill Peta of the Fort Whoop-Up Black Powder Club loading the cannon (Lethbridge News Now)

By Justin Goulet

Ready, aim, fire! Replica cannon fired for first time at Fort Whoop-Up

Jul 18, 2019 | 11:48 AM

LETHBRIDGE, AB – Fort Whoop-Up celebrated an addition to its armory Thursday morning.

A new replica cannon donated to the Lethbridge site was fired off for the first time.

The piece is a replica of the cannon originally stationed at the fort in the late 1800s.

READ MORE: Replica cannon donated to Fort Whoop-Up

The new replica’s blueprints were drawn up over 20 years ago by local historian and western artist George Kush.

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He said he feels ‘somewhat surprised and pleased’ that he’s been a part of the process to bring the replica cannon to the fort.

“I had absolutely no idea that more than 20 years later, those blueprints that I made would be invaluable,” he said.

“I’m just tickled pick that everything worked out the way it did, it’s just superb…and to see it again! It’s just an absolute replica, (it’s) perfect in every detail.”

Local business D & D Machine Works Ltd. built the cannon, and team member Dustin Vander Woude said it was certainly a unique project to work on.

“You don’t get to design and build a cannon every day,” he said.

“Working with these guys with the blueprints and turning that into modern technology… (it was) a neat experience for us.”

Vander Woude said one of the biggest challenges was to make the cannon look as close to the original as possible.

“The design from back in the day (was) a little different than how we do things now, so we started off with a solid chunk of material, 12-inch diameter, so we had to machine it down, get the trunnions put on there and make it look as it should,” he explained.

He said seeing the cannon fire off effectively Thursday morning felt great after the hard work that was put into the project, adding there was easily 50 hours of machine work put in by his colleague Nathan Van Will.

Vander Woude added that Fort Whoop-Up is an integral part of the community and the cannon helps celebrate Lethbridge’s history, which D & D owner Dennis Barbour felt was important to do.

A display cannon was already positioned at the popular tourist destination, but this is the first fireable cannon on-site since the Galt Museum & Archives took over operations at the fort in the summer of 2016.