It's been awhile since I wrote to you about Preserve America activities in Stevens County. I was planning to submit a grant proposal November 31st. This year however the due date has been moved up to November 18th. So time is short and there are several things to catch up on.
Executive Decision:
Over the summer I have re-ordered copies of the DVD, Crossroads on the Columbia that looked at the History of Stevens County from Grady Knight who did the production on it for free. I will need more to accompany the 7 copies of the grant when submitted. Grady would like to get some compensation for his work and materials. So lately I have been asking for a $10 donation if people keep the disk. This has accumulated a small amount of money ($50 so far). In order to create a paper trail and demonstrate some activity on our part, I have deposited the money in the general funds of Stevens County. I am asking this group for permission to send that money to Grady. Please respond with comments about that to show that this is not an arbitrary decision.
History Detectives:
Some of you may have seen the front page article in the Statesman Examiner asking for "History Detectives" to help with the scanning, cataloging and posting of documents we discover in the research for Preserve America. Their labor will be counted as in-kind contribution to the project which needs a 50% match. The response has been great. I have 22 people who want to help from just this one article. Should we get the grant, I think we can find several times that number by putting the article in more papers, talking to clubs, churches, businesses etc. In order to keep their interest, I am in the process of doing a pilot project on a 450-page document I scanned last month. It is called "Parsnips, Rutabagas and Love" by Arlene Lorenz. It's sortof a "Little House on the Prairie" in Park Rapids. But the grant is job one right now.
Visitor Maps and Auto Tours:
I am working on a project funded by the Forest Service to create Visitor Maps for each of the three NE Washington Counties, Ferry, Stevens and Pend Oreille. You can find out more about that at: http://cs.theheritagenetwork.org/forums/51.aspx. As part of that project I will be developing auto tours in Stevens County and reprising existing tours in Ferry and Pend Oreille Counties. These will focus mostly on local history, often at points where towns or villages once existed or other points such as mines, forts, graves, missions etc. This project is a great opportunity to talk about Preserve America. If you are part of a group that would like to be involved in either the Visitor Map (AKA Mud Map) project or Preserve America, let me know and I can talk to your group about them.
Crunch Time:
Don't be surprised to get a call from me in the next few days. I will want to discuss your groups role in the research project - this usually will mean that there is some money directed to compensate your group for access to documents, pictures and artifacts that we can incorporate in the Stevens County Crossroads on the Columbia Digital Archive. I will want to quantify that and solicit a letter of support.