Skowhegan History House Museum & Research Center recently received two major grants funding essential projects at the museum.
Maine Community Foundation recently granted $6,000 in support of the “River Bateaux” exhibit and three illustrative panels. One of the three 24-inch-by-42-inch exterior panels will feature the bateaux used on the Kennebec River by Benedict Arnold’s soldiers in 1775 as well as the river drivers who navigated the river moving wood downstream to mills, according to a news release from the center. Two other panels will highlight the historic riverfront near the History House, Elm Street and Skowhegan Island. Patrons will be able to visually relate information provided on the panels with actual locations in front of them.
A Davis Family Foundation grant of $7,691 also was received and will support two preservation projects. One project focuses on preserving the Civil War Uniform of native son, Alexander Crawford Jr. Funds will cover the fees of a professional conservator and the construction of an archival safe display cabinet which will house the uniform and Crawford’s other personal artifacts, according to the release. A second project will digitally preserve 300 of the museum’s oldest and most precious newspapers. Digital images of each newspaper will be created and converted to searchable files using optical character recognition software. As a result, researchers should be able to search the newspapers on a computer without having to touch the nearly 200-year-old scripts.
Both of these grants assist the museum in preserving and promoting Skowhegan’s ‘cultural heritage.
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