The Shania Twain Centre was a city-owned

tourist attraction A tourist attraction is a place of interest that tourists visit, typically for its inherent or exhibited natural or cultural value, historical significance, natural or built beauty, offering leisure and amusement. Types Places of natural beaut ...

that operated in

Timmins Timmins ( ) is a city in northeastern Ontario, Canada, located on the Mattagami River. The city is the fourth-largest city in the Northeastern Ontario region with a population of 41,145 at the 2021 Canadian census and an estimated population of ...

, Ontario, from 2001 to 2013. It exhibited memorabilia,

awards An award, sometimes called a distinction, is given to a recipient as a token of recognition of excellence in a certain field. When the token is a medal, ribbon or other item designed for wearing, it is known as a decoration. An award may be d ...

and other personal items loaned to the Centre by singer

Shania Twain Eilleen Regina "Shania" Twain ( ; born August 28, 1965) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. She has sold over 100 million records, making her one of the List of best-selling music artists, best-selling music artists of all time and the best-sel ...

, who was raised in Timmins.

History

The Shania Twain Centre was opened on June 30, 2001. On November 2, 2004, Twain visited the Centre and officially declared it open before an audience of hundreds of fans from around the world, some of whom had queued for up to 20 hours for the opportunity of an autograph and greeting with Twain.

Annual fan conventions

From 2003 to 2012, fans of Shania Twain traveled to Timmins for the International Shania Twain Fan Convention. 32 fans attended in 2003. At subsequent conventions held each August: * 2004: Two large gifts from Twain to the Centre were unveiled: the stage from her "Up" tour and her tour bus. Twain band members Cory Churko and JD Blair attended the convention. * 2005: Approximately 100 fans attended for the year's four-day event. Drummer JD Blair and guitarist Randall Waller participated. * 2006: Drummer JD Blair and fiddler Allison Cornell attended. * 2007: 50 fans attended. Events included a karaoke night, a country party, a mini-golf tournament and Go-cart races. Drummer JD Blair and guitarist Randall Waller sent messages. * 2008-2012: Conventions were held annually. The 2011 convention included fans from the UK,

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

and the US.

Costs to the city

Annual attendance for the Centre was originally projected at 50,000 but never reached above 15,000. Annual subsidies to the centre cost the city of Timmins $7 per resident, or $33 per centre visitor. A 2011 financial study suggested that the city council faced either closing the centre or spending $233,000 per year subsidizing its operations.

Closing

In May 2012, Shania Twain's management company had the singer's items repatriated to

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

, removing most of the Centre's exhibits. In January 2013, Timmins city officials announced plans to sell the Centre building due to declining attendance. The land and building were sold to

Goldcorp Goldcorp Inc. was a gold production company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The company stood among the largest gold producers in the world, employed about 15,800 people worldwide, engaged in gold mining and related activit ...

for $5 million, half the building's $10 million construction cost, as part of Goldcorp's plan to create an

open-pit Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique that extracts rock (geology), rock or minerals from the earth. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially ...

gold mine on the site. The Centre officially closed on February 1, 2013. Officials stated that items remaining after the centre's closure would be displayed at the city's airport and library. The building was demolished on December 3, 2014.Shania Twain Centre in Timmins is demolished

References

Affiliations

The Museum was affiliated with CMA,

CHIN The chin is the forward pointed part of the anterior mandible (List_of_human_anatomical_regions#Regions, mental region) below the lower lip. A fully developed human skull has a chin of between 0.7 cm and 1.1 cm. Evolution The presence of a we ...

, and

Virtual Museum of Canada Digital Museums Canada (DMC; , ''MNC'') is a funding program in Canada "dedicated to online projects by the museum and heritage community," helping organizations to build digital capacity. Administered by the Canadian Museum of History (CMH) wi ...