photo credit: Richard Wolak
I know it's a little late, but I meant to post this article about the Royal Canadian Mint that Kim Werker wrote. Robert and I worked in the pavilion during the Olympics overseeing the set up, tear down and the day-to-day operations. Originally, the plan was to allow 200 people a day to see and touch the medals. People would go into the medal room, watch a video on how the medals were made, be able to ask questions to an Engineer that actually worked on the medals and then be able to touch and take pictures with them. Well, that went out that window after day one. The Mint expected an attendance of 60,000, so when over 110,000 people came through during the two weeks of the Olympics, they were blown away. With an average wait time of 5 hours and a peak of 10 hours on the weekend, the pavilion was just incredible. Of course, why wouldn't it be? It was one of the few pavilions that were free... one of the only ones with a children's area where they could strike a coin and receive a goodie bag... a coin exchange... interactive displays with a photobooth... pins... the million dollar coin and gold bar exhibit... and of course, the medals.
Due to the overwhelming response, the Royal Canadian Mint reopened a smaller pavilion as part of the Paralympics from March 12-21st, 2010 at the Vancouver Public Library. Scroll to the bottom of Kim's article to read what I had to say about my experience of spending 28 straight days witht he Mint during the 2010 Olympics.
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