Utah State Historical Records Advisory Board 2024 Grant Awards Announced!
In May, the Utah State Historical Records Advisory Board (USHRAB) met to review 2024-2025 grant funding applications. The Board received many engaging applications detailing a variety of historical records that organizations across Utah hope to make accessible to the public. With roughly $29,000 to give, the Board received requests totaling over $37,000. We are now thrilled to announce this year’s winners, whose work is of significant importance in preserving and sharing Utah’s rich history.
American Fork Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum
The American Fork Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum was awarded $641 to construct a map storage display to house two original historic maps of the Lake City Fort. The city of American Fork, Utah, was first known as Lake City. Due to fear of reprisal for the murder of several members of the Timpanogos tribe at the Battle Creek Massacre on March 5, 1849, Nauvoo Legion General Daniel H. Wells directed residents of Lake City to build a fort for protection. An early school teacher living in the fort, Eugene A. Henroid, drew a map in 1853 that showed the fort’s layout with the names of the settlers and where they lived within the fort. In 1868, a larger map was drawn by Joseph B. Forbes, also a schoolteacher who worked with Henroid, and this map shows additional homes within the fort and the names of other families living in the area years later. These maps are primary sources of Utah Pioneers living in Lake City from 1853-1858 and ten years later in 1868. This grant project is to purchase building materials for an experienced volunteer cabinet maker to build a custom cabinet to contain two map drawers to appropriately store an 1853 map (24”x29”) and an 1868 map (33”x38”). The custom cabinet would be the right base height for viewing the existing Lake City Diorama and would not require additional museum floor space.
Moab Museum
The Moab Museum was awarded $7,475 to continue with phase two of the Channel 6 News Archive digitization project. This collection contains, in total, about 1,200 hours of film representing 2,200 individual news broadcasts of a seminal period in Moab’s history from 1989 to 2000. Each tape contains approximately two hours of footage. The Channel 6 Moab News Archive contains footage of historic icons and events, including a 1992 interview with the man dubbed the “Uranium King,” Charlie Steen, who discusses Moab and southeast Utah during the peak of the uranium boom. Additionally, the archive documents personal stories about the collapse of the mining and milling industry, mass exodus, and efforts to build a tourism-based economy. The VHS tapes will be converted to digital file formats and hosted online for public viewing.
Repertory Dance Theatre
Repertory Dance Theatre (RDT) was awarded $7,500 for the inventory, assessment, and cataloging of 58 years of historical dance videos and records that trace the growth of the company, the arts in Salt Lake City, and the national story of American modern dance. This project is part of a multi-year plan to celebrate RDT’s 60th anniversary in 2026 and includes the history of the University of Utah, which initially hosted the company, and the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center, which was constructed in large part through RDT’s efforts. The records also contain information about the choreography, lighting, music, props, and staging of the dances within RDT’s repertory, which are vital for the recreation of these works for future audiences. This includes the works of Michio Ito, a Japanese American choreographer who worked between 1916 and 1960. RDT’s performance videos, rehearsal clips, documentary films, and recordings explore over three decades’ worth of efforts to educate, perform, and increase appreciation for this often-forgotten modern dance pioneer. USHRAB grant funds will be used to hire an archivist to assess, inventory, and catalog this archive of 107 banker’s boxes of A/V materials and documents to complete the finding aids for the entire collection and determine priorities for digitization.
Southern Utah University
Southern Utah University was awarded $6,752 to rehouse seven photograph and negative collections:
- Branch Normal School Photograph Collection, 1897-1913
- Branch Agricultural College Photograph Collection, 1913-1953
- College of Southern Utah Photograph Collection, 1953-1969
- Southern Utah State College Photograph Collection, 1969-1990
- Southern Utah University Photograph Collection, 1990-2004
- Iron County Historical Photograph Collection, 1878-1970
- University Historic Slides, 1965-2006
Six of the seven photo collections document the rich history of Southern Utah University from its inception in 1897 to 2004, when photographs switched to digital formats. The school’s photo collections are divided to reflect the different names of the institution over the years as it grew from a small teacher-training college to a two-year college and later to a university. Student life, athletics events, theater productions, classroom work, graduating classes, faculty, campus buildings and landscapes, and special events are recorded through images. Many images are well-identified with people, places, or events described, drastically increasing their research value.
The Iron County Historical Photograph Collection expands the geographic scope beyond the university to the surrounding community. This collection documents the changing landscape and growth of Iron County through photos of prominent buildings and aerials. The lives of those in the community are recorded through the trades and industries. K-12 school events, access to water, religion, homes, and civic events document the daily lives of regular people from the founding of Cedar City and Iron County, Utah (earliest photos are from the late 1870s) to the late 20th century.
Sundance Institute
The Sundance Institute was awarded $5,500 to digitize photos, contact sheets, slides, and negatives in their collection that depict the Sundance Film Festival and the various Sundance Institute Labs. Their archives team has already preserved the years 1981-1997, and with this grant, they’ll be focusing on 1998-2000. Thanks to The University of Utah’s J. Willard Marriott Library digitization services, these records will soon be available to the public on the Sundance website.
The Sundance Institute Archives seeks to inspire and educate through preservation and access to the unique story of Sundance Institute, the artists it supports, their creative process, and the history of this work in Utah. By collecting, preserving, promoting, and providing access to the seminal work of independent storytellers and the unique history of the organization, the Archives creates context and an opportunity for discovery and dialogue around the creative process, independent storytelling, the creative and career trajectories of individual artists, and its cultural impact.
The USHRAB’s grant program is funded by a State Board Programming Grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission at the National Archives. The USHRAB assists public and private non-profits, as well as non-Federal government entities throughout the State of Utah in the preservation and use of historical records.
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