On Saturday, September 29th a special event took place at a special place.

There is not a lot of places in North America, that would be directly tied to the events of WWII. One of these places is hidden directly in Mississauga, where I live and its existence is unknown to the most of the local residents. The red-brick building at 1352 Lakeshore Road East is all that’s left of Small Arms Ltd., a Crown company that produced close to two million Brens, Lee Enfields and other small arms between 1941 and 1945. The only remaining building was originally used as a weapons testing facility. The building is located in the middle of undeveloped piece of land an itself is in quite desolate state.

But times seem to be changing. The event on the 29th September was to be beginning of the new life for this facility. Of course not related to weapons production any more, it is to be converted to an art gallery. The event was a day of open doors for public, which could see past, present as well as plans for the future. What made the event even more interesting was accompanying display of WWII vehicles and reenactors in their gear, courtesy of multiple reenacting units from the GTA area. I was quite pleased to see high interest in the event, which attracted a lot of visitors though it wasn’t promoted in any significant manner. So let’s hope that this event might have helped at least a bit to increase awareness of the WWII and it’s impact on local community as well as to breathe new life into this piece of history that until recently seemed to be destined for demolition and  oblivion.

You can find a lot of detailed information about the Small Arms Ltd. plant here.