Oil Museum of Canada

10/14/2026

Keep your tootsies warm this winter with a little piece of Canada’s oil history! 🧦🛢️ Our Oil Museum of Canada socks are cozy, fun, and perfect for museum lovers. Grab a pair and keep the history going—one warm step at a time!
Available in size small (5-10) and One Size Fits Most.

10/13/2026

Today, we’re taking a closer look at oil company safety mascots. You may have heard of “Safety Sam” housed in the Oil Museum’s Tourist Information Centre, but what about “Skip Hazard”? While his name may not be quite as catchy or alliterative, this mascot encourages workers to skip hazards by teaching them several important lessons about refinery safety.

In this comic produced by the Union Gas company, Skip walks with two other characters through a generic oil refinery pointing out dangerous hazards and eliminating them before they become major issues (e.g. dirty workstations, missing floorboards, exposed electrical equipment, etc.).

This cute little mascot along with many others demonstrates the need for accessible safety PSAs within the oil industry, as well as a general tendency for companies to make safety an important part of their brand image.

See if you can spot Skip Hazard’s ol’ pal Safety Sam next time you’re out at the museum!

10/09/2026

10/08/2026

🌳 Thanks for helping our site grow!

A big thank you to the many volunteers who recently came out to our site to help plant another 300 native trees and shrubs! These new plantings join the 1,000 trees already planted to create a mini forest as part of our ongoing initiative to naturalize a portion of the museum’s ten-acre site. A very special thank you is needed for the following groups for their participation:

Tree Canada / Arbres Canada
Skyline Living Sarnia region
TD Tree Days
St. Clair Region Conservation Authority

10/07/2026

Do you know how hard it is to get people excited about a product that they have never heard of or seen before or used? That is what confronted the early natural gas industry!

They had to teach people how to use natural gas and natural gas appliances. They started with demonstrations of gas lights in their showrooms and in front of the offices then they set up cooking schools at local fairs and home economics classes.

This was a different method of cooking using a gas stove since it produced even heat and could be regulated. Home economists even wrote new cookbooks for these appliances.

10/05/2026

This suit jacket once belonged to Bob Grimshaw, first plant manager of Petrosar's Corunna plant.

Robert “Bob” Grimshaw was born in 1936 and grew up in Toronto. After graduating from University of Toronto in chemical engineering, he found work in Edmonton. In 1974, Bob was head hunted to work at Petrosar’s new Corunna location as their first plant manager.

Bob was known for being very involved as plant manager. He never stayed in his office long and would always be out and about in the plant, taking the time to talk to the labourers with the goal of knowing all 500 of the plant’s employees by name.

Bob Grimshaw retired from his position as plant manager in 1993, around the same time Nova Chemicals acquired Petrosar.

This Petrosar suit jacket was made by the plant’s employees and gifted to Bob as an anniversary gift, and he was known to wear it often.

Bob Grimshaw passed away in February 2026 in his 90th year. He will be forever remembered for his contributions to Petrosar, involvement in Sarnia’s community, and his dedication to his family.

10/02/2026

🎃 Calling all goblins, ghosts, and helpful humans 🎃

We're looking for volunteers to help bring some Halloween magic to the Oil Museum of Canada. Join us for our Cackling Cauldrons Trick-or-Treat event on Saturday, October 31 from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Help us welcome families, hand out treats, and make the event special for our visitors. Costumes are encouraged! 🍬🍭

Contact us today: https://loom.ly/WIyG3L8

09/30/2026

🚧Under Construction🚧

Langbank Log Cabin and Post Office was built in 1895 in Dawn Township for James C. Wood who was the township treasurer and first postmaster in Dawn Township. It is a traditional early settler log house construction. In his home, Wood established the post office to help with mail delivery for himself and his neighbours. He named the post office "Langbank" after the Scottish village where he had lived.

William John Sinclair bought the 150-acre farm in 1914. Over time, he built a large addition onto the original log cabin. He also added a verandah along the front of the house and covered the entire house with white siding.

For many years, the Langbank cabin stayed hidden. In 1966, Lorne Northcott bought the farm and planned to tear down the old house. When he started taking off the outside walls, he found a surprise. Underneath the modern siding was an original log cabin!

In 1975, Lorne gave the cabin to the Oil Museum of Canada, and it holds a heritage designation from the Village of Oil Springs. In the 1990s, museum staff added wooden boards to the outside to protect the logs. This fall, the museum is removing the outer board and batten layer to assess and undertake restoration work to preserve the logs, and the cabin, for future generations.

09/29/2026

This is an example of an early oil lamp called a cruise lamp.

Dating from the 18th century, lamps such as this one gained popularity since they burned brighter and longer than candles, and helped to extend productive working hours past sundown.

This lamp looks quite different from the later oil lamps we are used to seeing at most museums and antique stores. In this early design, the spout would contain a cotton wick, and the circular basin would contain fish oil or fat which would be burned to produce light.

One of the most common sources of fat for lamps during this time came from hunting whales, which nearly caused them to go extinct. Thankfully, Abraham Gesner’s invention of Kerosene replaced fish oil in lamps, saving whales from near extinction and providing the public with a much cheaper and cleaner-burning light source.