Murray Wood: Who's hot... and who's not
Every Friday, Murray Wood takes a look back at the week's news and decides who's hot... and who's not. This week's list ...
Just in time for the lead-up to Halloween, the RCMP Heritage Centre’s Macabre Museum is back.
The exhibit features artifacts from notorious criminal cases investigated by Mounties.
“There is something that fascinates us about crime, of fictional crime, murder mysteries,” Jodi-Ann Eskritt, the curator for the RCMP Historical Collection Unit, said.
One of the cases featured involves father and son Kenneth and William MacLean. They were Americans working as farmhands in Alberta around 1932.
“They decided that one of the farmers they were working for had more money than they did and that they would help themselves to it and, in the process they murdered (the farmer),” Eskritt said.
The father and son were convicted and hanged. The museum features rope used to hang them.
Another creepy exhibit is of the Benito Bandits, who killed two constables in 1935.
A three-day manhunt for the bandits ended just outside Banff National Park.
The three bandits were killed in a shootout with police.
“It was a bit of a sensational case at the time and it caused a lot of people to start locking their doors,” Eskritt said.
Death masks were made of the bandits and they can be viewed at the Macabre Museum.
“So we have the faces of the three bandits in the collection. It looks almost as if they are sleeping,” explained Eskritt.
The Heritage Centre is open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week. Proof of vaccination is required to get in.
