What's New
Whats New
Redpath Sugar Museum Preservation Initiative
For more than four decades, the Redpath Sugar Museum shared the story of Canada’s oldest sugar company with our Toronto community and visitors from all over the world. Through a new preservation and digitization initiative, we're working to ensure the longevity of the museum’s artifacts and records so that we can continue to share our history for generations to come.
When the Redpath Sugar Museum opened at the Toronto Refinery in 1979 to mark the plant’s 25th anniversary, it did more than celebrate a milestone. It created a living classroom. With photographs, books, documents and artifacts, the museum traced Redpath Sugar’s place in Canadian industry. Exhibits introduced visitors to founder John Redpath and his family, the evolution of the Redpath® Sugar brand and the modern refining process on Toronto’s waterfront.
That living classroom was built and, for 42 years, sustained by curator and corporate archivist Richard Feltoe. He joined Redpath in 1978 under a legacy initiative launched by then-president Sir Neil Shaw.
“They said, ‘Make a museum,’ so I did,” said Richard.
Richard was, for many years, the museum’s entire staff.
“I developed the educational program, the collections management, the installation, the care of collections, conservation, tour guiding—the whole kit and caboodle,” he said.
The museum welcomed thousands of students each year, especially in grades 7–8, teaching them about our operations and history.
Over the decades, the collection grew with intention, from tableware like sugar casters, spoons and nippers to a fully digitized archive of historic advertising from the 1880s onward. Some treasures are truly one-of-a-kind.
“We have the original guest book from the refinery’s official opening, signed by Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip,” said Richard. “We also have the pen the Queen used and photographs of the moment.”
Like many cultural spaces embedded in active industrial facilities, the museum faced new realities after COVID-19. Health, security and operational constraints made it difficult to bring visitors onto the refinery site. With gratitude for more than 40 years of service, we made the decision to close the museum and concentrate on long-term preservation and expanding access to the collection to a broader audience. Richard was asked to lead that transition.
“Some people asked if dismantling what I built makes me sad,” he said. “Because I’m the one ensuring its long-term preservation in other institutions, it leaves me with a sense of full-circle satisfaction. If I pull this off, I’ll feel I’ve achieved my life’s goals.”
That work is well underway. The founding family materials are being returned to descendants. Artifacts from the original Redpath Sugar Montreal Refinery, which opened in 1854 and closed in 1980, are moving to a museum-connected organization in Montreal that will steward the collection and collaborate with local institutions on future displays about Redpath’s role in the city.
The Toronto-focused materials are being evaluated for long-term stewardship, including decisions about when digitized records can replace fragile originals.
“We’ve got beautiful but very fragile printed advertisements,” said Richard. “Do we need to keep every original when we have high-resolution scans we can use without limitation, or is it better to place the originals in a proper archive that can invest in conservation? Those are the calls we’re weighing now.”
An early mentor once told Richard, he would have the kind of career where he could go home and say, "I had a good day, and I can’t wait to get back tomorrow."
“That’s been true for me,” said Richard. “I’ve been very lucky.”
What began as a legacy project became a legacy preserved. The Redpath Sugar Museum may no longer host visitors, but the knowledge and history it held will live on in classrooms, reading rooms and exhibition halls, where Canadians will be able to explore how John Redpath’s 19th-century vision helped shape the future we are proud to continue today.
