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Vol. 25:2 ISSN 0160-8460 Summer 1997
NHPRC Recommends Nine Grants Totaling up to $264,771
The National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) met on June 19, 1997, and recommended up to $149,394 for four documentary editing projects, $25,254 for three documentary publication subvention grants, $30,000 for one records access project, and up to $60,123 for one project that carries out national archival agendas. The grant recommendations were made in response to more than $947,800 in requests.
The Commission welcomed two new members: United States Senator James M. Jeffords of Vermont, who represents the Senate, and United States Congressman Roy Blunt (7th District, Missouri), who represents the House of Representatives.
The next meeting of the Commission is scheduled for November 18, 1997. The next deadline for grant applications is October 1, 1997.
For this application review cycle, the Commission received several more competitive applications than it had grant funds to support. Therefore, a number of awards were made contingent on the availability of additional FY 1997 funds. These monies come from the returns of unexpended grant funds from completed projects or from unmet matching offers. In the following list, an "up to" or "contingent" amount indicates an award that was recommended, but that can be made only if funds become available by the end of the current fiscal year.
Documentary Editing Projects and Subventions
- Colgate Rochester Divinity School/Bexley Hall/Crozer Theological Seminary, Rochester, NY: A conditional grant of up to $52,500 to pay the salaries and fringe benefits of the two assistant editors of the Howard Thurman papers. As a religious and intellectual leader, Thurman (1900-1981) dedicated his life to bringing together people of different faiths, races, and classes. Throughout his career, Thurman tried to reform Christian doctrine with elements of Mohandas Gandhi's critique of traditional Christianity and his principles of unity and non-violent social change. Thurman's message powerfully influenced civil rights leaders beginning in the 1930s.
- East Stroudsburg University, East Stroudsburg, PA: A conditional grant of up to $26,250 to pay portions of the editor's and associate editor's salaries and related fringe benefits, as well as a share of the costs for travel, supplies, and copying, for the Papers of the War Department, 1784-1800. The project is reconstructing a collection that was destroyed by a fire in 1800 in the office of the War Department. Recipient copies of documents sent from the War Department and retained copies of documents sent to the department exist in hundreds of collections across the country. During the years considered - 1784-1800 - the War Department was responsible not only for military affairs, but also for Indian, veteran, and naval affairs.
- University Press of New England, Andover, NH: A grant of $8,000 to subvene publication of The Correspondence of Ethan, Ira, and Levi Allen, Vol. 1.
- University Press of New England, Andover, NH: A grant of $8,000 to subvene publication of The Correspondence of Ethan, Ira, and Levi Allen, Vol. 2.
- Kent State University Press, Kent, OH: A grant of $9,254 to subvene publication of The Papers of Robert A. Taft, Vol. 1.
Records Access Projects
- Lincoln Memorial University, Abraham Lincoln Museum, Harrogate, TN: A grant of $30,000 for a one-year project to conduct a survey of the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum's archival collection to identify the size and scope of its manuscript, photograph, scrapbook, and university archives components, and to arrange and describe the manuscript collection, to prepare catalog records of these collections, with further arrangement and description of the photographs, scrapbooks, and university archives in that priority order as time and resources allow.
Projects Recommended Subject to the Availability of Funds, in Priority Order
(1) Pomona College, Claremont, CA: A contingent grant of up to $32,400 to pay portions of the editor's and associate editor's salaries and benefits for the Letters of Lucretia Coffin Mott. The project will prepare a one-volume edition of selected letters; the volume will include a calendar of all known Mott correspondence. Mott (1793-1880), a Quaker, committed her life to women's rights, school and prison reforms, temperance, peace, religious tolerance, and the abolition of slavery.
(2) New York State Education Department, Albany, NY: A contingent grant of up to $60,123 to the Department's State Archives and Records Administration for a project to carry out a comprehensive collection assessment.
(3) Kent State University, Kent, OH: A contingent grant of up to $38,244 to pay the salary and fringe benefits of the assistant editor, as well as consultants' fees, travel, and services for the Robert A. Taft Papers. Taft (1889-1953) served as U.S. Senator from Ohio from 1939 until his death. A co-sponsor of the Taft-Hartley Act, he was a conservative who believed in equality of opportunity, but opposed legislation that impeded individual liberty. Taft also opposed major military commitments overseas in the postwar era, including U.S. membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, because he doubted that the United States could solve the problems of other countries. The project will produce a selective book edition of Taft's papers in four volumes, for the first of which the NHPRC is providing a subvention.
