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Greater Hudson Heritage Network (GHHN) is delighted to announce that its previously funded Save America's Treasures, funded by the National Park Service in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and administed by the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS), which was terminated on April 8, 2025, was reinstated on May 21, 2025!
GHHN's previously funded grant of $269,038.00 from Save America’s Treasures was to conserve objects from 10 small and mid-size museums in New York State.
President Trump’s Executive Order 14238, which terminated IMLS, was filed on March 14. The Attorneys General of 21 states filed a federal lawsuit, Rhode Island v. Trump, to halt the administration’s dismantling of IMLS. In response, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction ordering the Administration to restore terminated IMLS staff and grants to recipients in the 21 plaintiff states. The judge's ruling on May 13th, 2025, in the 21 states' attorneys general case ordered the IMLS to revert to its pre-executive order status, including restoring staff, contractors, and resuming grant processing. On May 20, the Administration filed a status report describing its compliance with that order. GHHN received notification on May 21 from IMLS that our Save America's Treasures grant had been reinstated.
“We are grateful to the 21 Attorney Generals, especially New York State AG Letitia James and our State legislators, for their support of cultural organizations. We are cautiously optimistic as we celebrate this progress."
said GHHN Executive Director Priscilla Brendler. "However, we must remember that this could be temporary. While reinstatement will help our work move forward, the reality is that the funds could disappear again without warning.”
The objects from 10 small and mid-size museums include 35 items of historical significance and a wide range of materials, which, after a preliminary assessment, were selected as those items most in need of treatment. A panel of conservators will work on the objects over 8-10 months and will also participate in a Community Engagement Conservation Workshop at each museum for staff and visitors to highlight unique challenges and new discoveries during the process of conserving these unique stories from New York State. The conservation of these 35 projects will restart immediatly and continue through the Summer of 2027. The project will be matched with $269,359 in non-federal share for a total project cost of $538,398.
The objects to be conserved are connected thematically to: ‘Hidden History’ – these objects of national significance tell the stories of people who bumped convention and forged a path entirely their own; their innovations, sacrifices, and dreams helped shape the New York State story and, in turn, the story of our country:
Alice Austen's travel darkroom kit, camera case, and photograph album
Alice Austen House
Conservation work to be done by Kate Wight Tyler and Donia Conn
Alice Austen's work represents life through the lens of a lesbian woman - over 7000 images of a changing New York City, documenting NYC's immigrant populations and upper-middle-class Victorian women's activities. One of America’s first female photographers to work outside of the studio, Austen often transported up to 50 pounds of photographic equipment on her bicycle to capture her world. Her photographs represent street and private life through the lens of a lesbian woman whose life spanned from 1866 to 1952. Austen was a rebel who broke away from the constraints of her Victorian environment and forged an independent life that broke boundaries of 'acceptable' female behavior and social rules.
Major John Andre’s Flute
Boscobel House and Gardens
Conservation work to be done by Kate Wight Tyler
A new breed of British officer who raised himself solely on merit, Andre (an accomplished flutist) left an indelible mark on the stories of both Britain and America by organizing the defection of America’s most notorious traitor, Benedict Arnold. He was tried and hanged as a spy. However, within months of his execution, popular culture memorialized him as he came to symbolize an idealized version of British honorability and innocence lost to war.
Cayuga County Suffragists Journal
Cayuga Museum of History & Art
Conservation work to be done by Donia Conn
Badly fire-damaged, the journal is locally and nationally significant as a primary source document from the suffrage movement in New York. Containing the names of nationally significant figures as well as local players - including Isabel and Emily Howland, Harriet Tubman, and David M. Osborne, the journal also details various meetings and activities undertaken by those involved in the fight for women’s suffrage in Cayuga County. Some entries relate to collaborations with other groups such as the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, the Onondaga Nation, and the Boy Scouts. Taken together, these details show the movements and activities of the suffragists in Cayuga County and Central New York, as well as how they collaborated with suffragists in other parts of the state and the country.
Portrait of Elizabeth Dyckman
Dyckman Farmhouse Museum Alliance
Conservation work to be done by West Lake Art Conservation
Widowed at a young age, Elizabeth Dyckman was left to finish building her new home, now known as Boscobel House and Gardens. Thanks to the 2,000 letters in the Boscobel archives, she is one of the best-documented women of the American Revolutionary period. Her portrait helps bring to life the issues addressed in her letters, including slavery, women's rights, parenthood, loyalism, and agriculture.
Fedderman wine bottles and labels
Greyton H. Taylor Wine Museum
Conservation work to be done by Kate Wight Tyler
Former sharecropper Raymond Fedderman was the first Black man to own/operate a winery in NYS (second in US) and the first Black man to proudly appear on his own wine bottle label. Fedderman fought against the long-standing racial bias in the wine community and the world at large but ultimately was a victim of racial and economic discrimination. These bottles are from the one and only vintage produced by the winery.
‘Youth Eternal’ sculpture and fountain
The Heckscher Museum of Art
Conservation work to be done by Kate Wight Tyler
Sculpted by Evelyn Beatrice Longman, the first female sculptor to achieve full membership at the National Academy of Design and the second woman artist overall. Responsible for designing and sculpting all the interior carvings in the Lincoln Memorial’s North and South Chamber, Longman's works helped break the gender barrier of the male-dominant art form, allowing for a new generation of female artists and sculptors.
Five painting albums containing watercolors on pith and skeleton leaves and Catherine Van Rensselaer Bonney’s scrapbook
Historic Cherry Hill
Conservation work to be done by Donia Conn
While Catherine Van Rensselaer Bonney's photo scrapbook chronicles her experience as an American missionary during an era when missions were shifting from male to female-dominated, her souvenir and decorative art collections illustrate American fascination (even obsession) with Chinese goods and culture. During her years in Canton as a missionary, Bonney began an unsanctioned school for Chinese girls, and her items reveal a life of devotion to her faith and her Chinese pupils.
Two Tammy Tarbell ceramics
The Iroquois Museum
Conservation work to be done by Goldberg Preservation Services
The Iroquois Museum holds the most comprehensive collection of modern Iroquois art worldwide. Growing up between Onondaga tribal land and Syracuse, Tammy Tarbell (Mohawk Turtle Clan) was influential in redefining Mohawk artistic traditions. The works offer a window into the Iroquois worldview, honoring relationships with the natural world and exerting rights to sovereignty and self-determination. Clay, used in both works, has been embraced by Haudenosaunee for over 3000 years. “Moon Phase” (1999) references Haudenosaunee oral tradition where the moon plays a predominant role. Untitled -91:68 (1990) features white deerskin thongs and a pit-fired finish. In Tarbell's Mohawk/Kanien'keha language the word for clay pot describes a woman's body - graceful neck, shoulders and belly celebrated in its form.
Lucille Ball “Professor” Ensemble as worn on “I Love Lucy”
Lucille Ball Desi Arnaz Museum
Conservation work to be done by Textile Conservation Workshop
The ensemble, also worn in S1/E6 “The Audition,” is one of the most iconic remaining pieces from the show. Starred in and produced by a woman and a Cuban refugee, “I Love Lucy” stands as one of the most innovative and influential American TV series of all time and a beacon of representation, featuring both the first interracial marriage and the first woman to appear pregnant on network television.
Charles Sherwood Stratton's Court Costume
(stage name General Tom Thumb)
Somers Historical Society
Conservation work to be done by Textile Conservation Workshop
Stratton, a person with dwarfism, was hired at the age of 4 by P. T. Barnum. The costume, worn when he performed for Queen Victoria, enhances the collection as a visual aid to the story of the evolution of the traveling menagerie business as a form of entertainment in America. Stratton’s story and rise to international celebrity bring explorations of the nature of exploitation and fame to the forefront.
In September 2024, the National Park Service (NPS) announced $25.7 million in Save America’s Treasures grants to fund 59 projects to preserve nationally significant sites and historic collections in 26 states and the District of Columbia. With these funds, organizations and agencies conserve significant U.S. cultural and historic resources, which illustrate, interpret, and are associated with the great events, ideas, and individuals that contribute to our nation’s history and culture.
The Save America’s Treasures grant program was established in 1998 to celebrate America's premier cultural resources in the new millennium. Since 1999, the Save America’s Treasures program has provided over $405 million from the Historic Preservation Fund (HPF) to more than 1,400 projects to provide preservation and conservation work on nationally significant collections, artifacts, structures, and sites.
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