Blog and Newsletter

GRANT OPPORTUNITY REMINDER:
Hidden collections in Maine?
(Don't miss the information session on March 4!)

DIGITIZING HIDDEN SPECIAL COLLECTIONS AND ARCHIVES:<http://www.clir.org/hiddencollections> Enabling New Scholarship through Increasing Access to Unique Materials
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) funds to create a national competition in 2015 to digitize and provide access to collections of rare or unique content in cultural heritage institutions. Its aim is to ensure that the full wealth of resources held by institutions of cultural heritage becomes integrated with the open Web.

DEADLINE: Initial proposal due:  April 30, 2015
(The application process has two phases. The initial proposal round is open, and those interested in applying for a grant through this program must submit an initial proposal by April 30. The final proposal round is by invitation only.)

GRANT AMOUNTS:  Maximum allowable request for 2015: single-institution projects: $250,000 / collaborative projects: $500,000  (Minimum allowable request for 2015: $50,000)

WHAT FORMATS ARE ELIGIBLE?
The range of media that can be termed special collections or archives is not restricted. Increasingly, valuable collections are composed of many formats, from paper, moving images on film or video, all types of sound recordings, ephemera, specimens, electronic files or data sets, works of art, to myriad types of artifacts.

WHAT QUALIFIES AS A HIDDEN COLLECTION?
For the purposes of this program, applicants must convincingly argue that their collections are "hidden" in the sense that they cannot be exploited for important scholarly work until they are fully digitized, discoverable and accessible.

COMPLETE INFORMATION AND GUIDELINES:  http://www.clir.org/hiddencollections

NOTE:
LIVE INFORMATION SESSION FOR PROSPECTIVE APPLICANTS
Wednesday, March 4, 2015, 2:00 - 3:00 pm Eastern time: CLIR will host a question-and-answer session for prospective applicants. See CLIR for more details: http://www.clir.org/hiddencollections/applicants

QUESTIONS?
For questions which are not answered in the application guidelines<http://www.clir.org/hiddencollections/applicants/applicantguidelines.html/applicantguidelines.html>, contact CLIR program staff at hiddencollections@clir.org<mailto:hiddencollections@clir.org>.
During the application period, CLIR accepts inquiries by e-mail only; no phone calls, please.

Live-in caretaker and curator/docent wanted for Nordica Homestead Museum in Farmington.  On site housing provided.   Anyone interested can write to:  P.O. BOX 763  Farmington, Maine 04938

Small Museums Scholarship

2015 AASLH Annual Meeting and Online Conference

Louisville, Kentucky

DEADLINE: 12 June 2015

The American Association for State and Local History will hold its Annual Meeting and Online Conference in Louisville, Kentucky from 16-20 September 2015. This year’s theme – The Power of Possibility - examines the personal, communal, and organizational journeys that lead to vibrancy, authenticity, social change and sustainability. 

Unfortunately, many working in our nation’s small museums feel as if we can only dream of attending this meeting. In a perfect world, boards would grant every request to fund our professional development. Institutions of modest means, however, may not have the resources to help us become effective stewards of our community’s memory.

Websites, listservs, and social media constantly offer new sources of technical and psychological support, but nothing is better than the face-to-face fellowship of sharing survival strategies. Every year, increasing numbers of Annual Meeting sessions address issues specifically affecting small museums. These sessions can be as practical and wide-ranging as training, marketing, and strategic planning. Other sessions focus on creative ways to forge and re-energize relationships with the surrounding community.

Now in its tenth year, AASLH’s Small Museums Committee is offering scholarships to any AASLH members who are full-time, part-time, paid, or volunteer employees of small museums. Each $500 scholarship will cover the cost of the conference registration and the Small Museums luncheon. Any remaining funds may be used to offset travel and/or lodging expenses.

To qualify, the applicant must work for a museum with a budget of $250,000 or less. They also must either be an individual AASLH member or work for an institutional member. Application forms are available at http://community.aaslh.org/small-museum-scholarship/

The deadline for applications is 12 June. The committee will email award winners by 29 June. For questions, please contact Bruce Teeple, Small Museum Scholarship Subcommittee Chair at mongopawn44@hotmail.com

Deadline for nominations is March 1, 2015.

Every year, AASLH bestows the Leadership in History Awards in recognition of excellence in the field of state and local history.

The Leadership in History Awards was established to encourage standards of excellence in the collection, preservation, and interpretation of state and local history in order to make the past more meaningful to all Americans. By publicly recognizing superior and innovative achievements, the Leadership in History Awards serves as an inspiration to others in the field.

AASLH recognizes excellence in the following areas: 

• Exhibits
• Public and educational programming
• Special projects
• Publications
• Multimedia
• Individual  Achievement

Applicants can self-nominate or nominate another project. Nominees need not be members of AASLH to qualify. Organizations of all sizes are encouraged to apply! Learn more about the awards by visiting the website.

Contact: Bethany Hawkins
hawkins@aaslh.org
615-320-3203

Call for creative works—written, art, photography, craft!

Working title:  Inspired, Inspiring, Inspire--French Heritage Women Create!

The Franco-American Women’s Institute (http://www.fawi.net) will be celebrating its 20th Anniversary in 2016.  The Franco-American Women’s Institute promotes the contributions of the French heritage women’s lives—past, present and future through its online presence and publishing their creativity.  For FAWI’s 20th Anniversary, there will be a publication of written works and visual arts to mark the present, active, creative lives of the women of the French heritage culture.  

This call for creativity looks towards the future as creating a legacy of the French heritage women, who they are, and what they want to convey about their lives in the present and future.  This anthology will incorporate the lives of the women who make up this cultural heritage—online, and hopefully, in print as well, and it will offer to the present and future generations a vivid compilation of voices and visuals to express modern-day, French heritage women and their creative works.  The anthology will build bridges of insight and understanding for all who will read and view the works.

This call for written/visual works seeks materials that are inclusive, encompassing, energetic and exemplary—realistic, fresh and mindful of how far we have come in our voices and visions as French heritage women.  Prose, poetry, song, artworks, photographs—will be open to interpretation by you, the women, in order to focus on the broad subject areas of  women’s lives and  to fully include and illustrate the women’s lives.  What are our legacies that we wish to pass onto the subsequent generations about who we are as a community of women?  This is our opportunity to present our modern-day selves in a body of work that reflects our lives.  Please consider submitting to this anthology.

Who can submit:  Women of French heritage, Franco-American, Québécois, Acadian, Métis, Mixed Blood, French Canadian, 'Cajun, Creole and Huguenot—are invited to submit.  This anthology will be a volume compiled of the women’s voices who are of the culture/heritage.

Works sought:

Prose, essay, fiction, creative non-fiction, memoir,  5,000 word limit

Poetry, 3 poems, or 1 long, 72 lines limit

Artworks, able to be scanned, 81/2 x 11 inches, limit

Photographs, able to be scanned, 81/2 x 11 inches, limit

Crafts represented by images, able to be scanned, 81/2 x 11 inches, limit

Submit works online to FAWI2000@aol.com 

Send written works as a .doc or .docx. only

Send images as .jpg with an artist’s statement accompanying all images

Submit a brief biography—telling the reader who you are and about your heritage background.

Deadline for submission:  May 30th 2015

If you have any questions about the submission process or ideas for a submission, do not hesitate to contact me via email FAWI2000@aol.com.

Thank you.

Rhea Côté Robbins, M.A.

641 South Main St.

Brewer, Maine 04412-2516

Email:  

FAWI2000@aol.com

Web Sites:

Author of 'down the Plains,' & Wednesday's Child

http://www.rhetapress.com/

Edited

Canuck and Other Stories

Rhea Côté Robbins, Editor

Canuck, by Camille Lessard Bissonnette, (1883-1970),~

translated by Sue Huseman, Ph.D. and Sylvie Charron, Ph.D.

La Jeune Franco-Américaine, The Young Franco-American

by Alberte Gastonguay, (1906-1978),~

translated by Madeleine C. Paré Roy

Françaises d'Amérique, Frenchwomen of North America

by Corinne Rocheleau Rouleau, (1881-1963),~

translated by Jeannine Bacon Roy

Director of:

Franco-American Women's Institute

Established 1996

2015 is the 19th Anniversary of FAWI!

http://www.fawi.net/

MAINE NATIONAL HISTORY DAY 2015 
CALL FOR JUDGES

Do you love history? Do you support dynamic hands-on projects for
students? Then we are looking for you!

Sign up now to be a judge for the 2015 Maine National History Day
competition, to be held at UMaine in Orono, on Saturday, March 28. Whether
you've been a judge for several years running, or have never experienced
the excitement and reward of History Day, we encourage you to take a few
minutes to join the 2015 team. It's an inspiring experience!

The competition runs from 10AM-3PM; judges must be on-site by 8:30AM.
Morning refreshments and lunch will be provided.

Judge registration this year is via the National History Day website.
Please go to http://me.nhd.org/ud/templates/registerLinks.php?cid=71 and
select “Judge” from the drop-down menu, then create a username and
password. Once you do that, youíll be directed to a form where you can
provide your name and contact info, and choose your preferred judging
categories.

Please note this form does not require ranking your choices so we
recommend selecting at least three categories (and more if you wish) that
you would be happily willing and able to judge. We make every effort to
align judge registrants with one of their chosen categories, but make no
guarantees.

We strongly encourage you to sign up by February 20, and, as an extra
incentive, we will put your name in a drawing for a great prize.
(Compliments of Maine Historical Society and Maine Humanities Council.)
The final deadline for judge registration, however, is February 27.

You'll get an initial automated confirmation email and, in early March,
Maine NHD coordinator John Taylor will be in touch with your judging
assignment, information and resources about the judging role and
responsibilities, and the logistics of the day.

For questions about judging, contact: John Taylor, Maine NHD Coordinator,
207-474-7133, john.m.taylor@maine.edu.

For more information on History Day 2015, visit
http://umaine.edu/history/national-history-day/, or
http://www.nationalhistoryday.org/.

And THANKS!

[PDF for easy sharing]

Governor’s Proposed Budget Threatens Maine's Archives and Museums

(Cumberland Center, Maine)—The Association of Maine Archives and Museums (MAM), the state's only membership organization dedicated to supporting and promoting Maine's collecting institutions, has released the following statement in response to Governor Paul LePage's recent budget proposal—a proposal that we believe would adversely affect a substantial number of Maine’s approximately 1200 collecting institutions and threaten the continued preservation of Maine’s historic structures and stewardship over the wealth of historical collections held in the public trust by these organizations. 

Governor LePage’s 2016/17budget proposes to eliminate state revenue sharing with municipalities in exchange for allowing localities to tax larger nonprofit organizations, including museums, archives, historical societies and historic sites.  Traditionally, revenue sharing provides roughly $60 million to municipalities to pay for services and reduce property taxes. The Governor’s proposal allows towns and cities to offset those losses by collecting property taxes from previously exempt nonprofits with $500,000 or more of assessed value.  The property/organization would be entitled to a 50% exemption (rather than 100%) with respect to the aggregate value exceeding $500,000.

The majority of Maine Archives and Museums’ members are collecting organizations running on operating budgets of less than $25,000 per year.  Only about 7.6% of all our members receive funding from government support of any kind: federal, state, or local.  A large number rely solely on volunteers and donations.  Yet, their property holdings include significant and irreplaceable historic structures such as lighthouses, sea captain’s homes, forts, one-room school houses, nineteenth century mills, heritage sites and historic farmsteads which would put them over and above the $500,000 threshold outlined in Governor LePage’s budget.  In short, these organizations serve as caretakers to the rich cultural history of Maine, preserving these structures from our collective past for future generations.  The governor’s proposal would end tax exemptions to the stewards of these historic properties. 

Moreover, these institutions are home to extensive collections documenting Maine’s history and culture.  Tens of thousands of documents, photographs, artifacts and artwork are held in trust—preserved by these non-profit organizations for the education and enrichment of future generations and the betterment of Maine’s communities.  Their facilities include storage space, obviously, but also public spaces where the community can engage with the past through educational and public programming, serving about 2.7 million visitors and patrons each year, including some 154,000 school children.

In a recent survey of Maine Archives and Museums’ members, more than half of the respondents indicated they would be adversely affected by Governor LePage’s changes regarding non-profit property tax exemptions.  MAM’s survey revealed the chilling affect the Governor’s policy change would have on non-profit museums, archives, historical societies and heritage sites:   Sixty-five percent felt the proposal would have a negative impact on their ability to meet their mission; while eighty-eight percent said they were concerned or very concerned about the proposed budget impact.  One respondent stated, “This proposed change…[will hamper] our ability to serve the public, and I foresee needing to restrict public access, reduce programming, and…further reduce our staffing levels.”  Another respondent declared, “[Our] museum would experience great difficulty in having to pay property taxes. We simply don't have that kind of money in our operating budget.  It is unclear how we would be able to do it--sell property, reduce the staff, etc.,...It would diminish the quality of what we offer to the public.”  A third expressed concern that Governor LePage’s budget “would require us to cut our budget by nearly 10% which would require eliminating several staff positions putting those people on unemployment. The negative consequences spiral outward.”

Not only do Maine’s collecting institutions function as the caretakers of our cultural heritage, they are work horses in Maine’s economy.  While the Governor has characterized these institutions as “takers,” MAM’s recent Economic Impact Statementproves him wrong:  Our members (which comprise only about a third of the state’s total museums and archives) employ hundreds, serve millions, and generate millions in revenue. MAM’s member institutions spend about $26 million annually in goods and services in the state.   A study in 2009showed that Maine’s museums alone generated more than $7.5 million in tax revenue for local and state government and supported some 1,300 jobs in Maine. This data is proof positive that this community gives far more than it takes.

MAM shares the view of the Maine Association of Nonprofits (MANP), which posted a response to the Governor’s previous statements about nonprofits being “takers, not givers” on their website on November 12.  They document the many ways in which nonprofits provide essential services to the people of Maine and carry out much of the work that is undertaken by governments in other contexts, while acting as important drivers for the state’s economy.  Additionally, Maine’s nonprofit arts and cultural organizations, many of whom are members of MAM, play a fundamental role in Maine tourism, an industry that many acknowledge as the state’s largest and that the Governor has recognized is important to Maine’s economy.  Perhaps a MAM member summed it up best:  “The governor's proposal would penalize [nonprofits] for providing more charitable services to the community - clearly a negative effect for all.”  The Association of Maine Archives and Museums agrees. 

Over the past four years, our industry has had a cordial and respectful relationship with Governor LePage.  We have applauded his support of the continued restoration of the Blaine House, one of Maine’s landmark historic properties. It is our hope that his second term in office will be characterized by the same regard for the organizations that share responsibility for preserving and promoting the arts, history, and culture of Maine, while bringing millions of visitors and millions of dollars to our state each year.

We reiterate our invitation, made in November, to Governor LePage to spend a day with us, visiting Maine’s collecting institutions.  We will work with the Governor’s staff to develop an itinerary of organizations that show the depth, breadth, and importance of Maine’s historical and artistic collections, as well as the deep commitment to public service that is shared by all our members.   Our hope is to foster a culture of appreciation and collaboration between our industry and the Office of the Governor as we continue our work in documenting and preserving Maine’s rich cultural, artistic and historic heritage. 

Maine Archives and Museums is the state’s only membership organization dedicated to supporting

and promoting Maine’s collecting institutions. To find out more, visit MaineMuseums.org.

###

Thursday, January 29^th, 4PM

The relationship between Indigenous communities and mainstream museums has changed significantly in recent decades as a result of Indigenous activism and new museum theory and practice. These changes include the sharing of curatorial authority, collaborative partnerships, and efforts to decolonize museums.~ Dr. Lonetreeís research examines the current state of contemporary exhibition practices at both national and tribal museums.~ Central to my analysis is exploring how museums can serve as sites of decolonization through honoring Indigenous knowledge and worldview, and discussing the hard truths of colonization in exhibitions in an effort to promote healing and understanding.

Archivist for Summer 2015

Camp Tecumseh,  a non profit overnight summer camp for boys founded in 1903 by three University of Pennsylvania Olympic athletes and located on Lake Winnipesaukee in Moultonborough, NH, seeks an Archivist for its 2015 summer season with the possibility of a multi-year summer appointment.

The Camp Tecumseh  Archives, housed in a room in an historic farmhouse, includes mostly paper-based materials dating from 1903 to the 2000s.  Of particular note are materials organized by type or by subject in the early 1990s by the author of a published CT history.   Materials are in file cabinets, on shelves, loose, and boxed.  More than one thousand photographs have been digitized, and it is anticipated that born-digital documents and images will become part of the collection.  All the work so far has been done by alumni, trustees, and staff; the Board of Trustees recognizes the need for professional assistance.

Possible tasks in 2015, depending upon hours / weeks worked, are:
-- Rehouse original photographs that have been digitized and prepare finding aid
-- Rehouse, arrange and describe a small collection to serve as an example for volunteers
-- Help prepare processing guidelines for volunteers
-- Appraise about five feet of Camp facilities records;  preserve, arrange, and describe those records of archival value; determine whether any of the materials warrant digitization
-- Determine appropriate processing scheme for about nine feet of historical documents collected for the Camp history and research notes generated by the project
-- Answer internal requests for information

Qualifications.
BA in relevant field.  Enrollment in MA or MLS program with archives management component and / or equivalent archives experience
Strong oral and written communication skills
Familiarity with archival theory and techniques: appraisal, accessioning , arrangement and description
Familiarity with preservation practices, including digitization for access
Familiarity with office software applications
Ability to lift and move 40 lb containers

Desirable skills.  Exhibit design and installation; records management.

An experienced consulting Archivist will make periodic visits and be available for consultation via phone, email.

Logistics and compensation.  CT recognizes that its location may discourage applicants.  For those who live beyond a reasonable commuting distance, the Camp will endeavor to provide room and board during the weeks  the Camp is in operation (June 21 - August 9, 2015); and room from August 10 to August 31 if the archivist wishes.   The prearranged housing of visiting coaches and alumni, however, may take precedence and may interrupt the Archivist's stay.   Meals also are available during the camp weeks to the successful candidate who is within commuting range.  Please note meals are with the campers, counsellors, and families; accommodations are in a building with shared bathrooms, and campers are boys aged 8 - 16.  The Camp employs females and married couples.

Compensation commensurate with skills and experience, and whether room and board being provided.

Please submit the following electronically to :
William Hamilton, Emeritus Trustee
 wghamilton@comcast.net

– A cover letter expressing interest in the position and outlining relevant experience and whether room and board likely to be necessary;
– A curriculum vitae of education and employment;
– A finding aid and additional writing sample in the form of exhibition text,  presentation, blog post, etc.

Any leads please send to me. I will follow up.  Thanks.

Cynthia Swank, CA, CRM

Inlook Group - PO Box 405 - Portsmouth, NH 03802-0405

cgswank@inlookgroup.com -- 603-964-9294