Huron County Museum Staff Complete Henderson Digitization Project

Written by Jacob Smith, Digitization Coordinator for the Huron County Museum. The photo above is a portrait of World War II serviceman Leon Prosser. A992.1040c 

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500 additional photographs of World War II servicemen have been catalogued, scanned, and uploaded to the Henderson Digitization Project’s virtual exhibit.  You can access these photographs through the Museum’s website or by clicking here.  These photographs were taken by Mr. J. Gordon Henderson (1913-1989), a Goderich-based photographer for over 40 years. During World War II, Mr. Henderson travelled to air training schools in Clinton, Goderich, and Port Albert, taking class pictures and photographing other activities on the bases.  During the war, military personnel would visit his studio in Goderich to have their portraits taken.  After the war, Mr. Henderson continued his professional photography business until his retirement in 1980.  In 1992, his family donated his professional work and equipment to the Huron County Museum.  

To increase awareness of Mr. Henderson, and Huron County’s role in World War II, the Henderson Digitization Project was created.  The project was a one-year, grant-funded project in 2013 to digitize his photographs of World War II air training in Huron County.  In 2021 and 2023, the project was revisited. During that time period, digitization staff catalogued and scanned the remaining photographs, and added the object information into the Museum’s database, PastPerfect. Then, staff uploaded the scanned images to the Henderson Digitization Project’s virtual exhibition page.  At the same time, the virtual exhibition was reorganized to ensure that multiple portraits of the same airmen were linked together. The project was completed in October 2023. 

This project is funded (in part) in part by the Government of Canada

Ce projet est financé (en partie) par le gouvernement du Canada.