The Village of Erieau is celebrating its centennial this year and starting Saturday, the Blenheim Heritage House will be featuring an exhibition to mark the milestone.
The name "Erieau" was coined in the early 1900s when the names of Lake Erie and Rondeau Bay were combined.
Kate Rosser-Davies, Assistant Curator of the Chatham-Kent Museum, says once upon a time passenger ships from Ohio would bring visitors to the sandbar.
"There's a boat propeller in the exhibit and on its own a boat propeller doesn't necessarily tell you that much but the boat propeller came from a specific boat that operated at a specific time in Erieau. So, that makes more than just an artifact on its own but an artifact with a story of its own with a history of its own," says Rosser-Davies.
The exhibit at the Blenheim Heritage House runs until the spring.
Rosser-Davies says the exhibit transports people to a time when large crowds would flock to the sandspit to enjoy fishing, boat races, dancing and picnics.
"When we're able to tell the story of a specific artifact, it makes it more than just an object that means nothing. It makes it more personable and alive a little bit," Rosser-Davies says.
Rosser-Davies says the exhibition is a reminder of the days when cottages and hotels dotted the bay and commercial fishing and the railway were central parts of village life.
"We take artifacts and we try to couple them with people's stories and tell people their own stories. So, we're reaching out to Erieau to get the stories and share them back with a wider community," says Rosser-Davies.