Past Grants Awarded

Finalization of improvements to their accessibility measures for sight-impaired visitors, including experiential interpretation, and for a workshop sharing best practices learned from this project.

A partnership with upwards of ten faith-based groups of diverse traditions uniting to host five film-and-discussion events on civics and religion.

Documentation of the oral histories of the working-class life of women and/or their descendants during the 1910-1940 period.

Development of a thematic and comprehensive understanding of facilitated discussion with the fishing community recorded since 2004 on the Narrative Stage and preparation of the materials for archival storage and public access.

A county-wide reenactment of the events of September, 1774, when the local British government was overthrown by weaponless militiamen.

An online exhibit and curriculum unit to be developed within the existing Disability History Museum website using the story of Anne Sullivan (Hellen Keller's famous teacher and Agawam, MA, resident) to tell the story of disability rights and poverty advocacy.

A residency to produce the local history theatre piece Mill, Mountain, River: A Child's Eye View of Olde Colraine alongside third and fourth graders in Colrain, MA. The play tells the story of child workers in the Griswoldville factories and will be produced over two weeks and presented publicly as well as to the school community.

Support for speakers, scholars, and publicity materials for the seventh annual Boston Muslim Film Festival.

Two four-day summer institutes for 60 Boston-area teachers. The institutes are loosely organized around the theme of women in African American history.

Production and installation of outdoors signage to help visitors interpret the history of the precarious entrance to Boston Harbor as viewed from Stony Beach in Hull, including the stories of pilots, lifesavers, lighthouse keepers and more.

Pre-production of a one hour television documentary on the untold story of women clerical workers organizing for pay equity, advancement, and recognition. The 9 to 5 Project addresses a significant aspect of feminist social movement history in the U.S. and raises important questions about labor history.

Production of a short film about historical discrimination against the Irish in Lowell. Lowell's "Irish Problem": The Town Vote to Fund a School for the Irish will be incorporated into fourth grade curricula.

Creation of multi-lingual playbills for the company's Road to Tolerance cycle of five plays, to be presented to Boston Public School students.

Development and implementation a multi-lingual exhibit of census-based maps of Boston telling the story of recent immigration in the city.

Support for development of the film Seams, a poetic oral history of women's experiences of the conflict between Britain and Ireland.

Production of a new, original play, The Mildred Files about a scandal involving the Academy's past interim director. The performance is part of the Academy's Women's Work Initiative, a multi-year series of events and productions focused on women in the performing arts.

A four-part reading and discussion group exploring the works of four pairs of authors who were known to have a complicated relationship with one another.

Preservation of the City of Lowell Division of Planning and Development Collection.

An on-line exhibit and archive of images, film clips and sound files related to the early years of WBCN FM in Boston and protest movements on Boston Common.

A pre-production grant to ValleyCAST for a script and trailer for a documentary about the Whitin family's mills in Whitinsville, MA and the employees in this company town.

Core exhibit planning for the Robbins House, a home built by the son of slavery survivor and Revolutionary War veteran Caesar Robbins in the early 1800s.

A series of six staged readings of plays from August Wilson's ten-play cycle about the lives of African Americans in the decades of the twentieth century.

Support for a script and trailer for a documentary film about the meaning of race in America.

Design and fabrication of a display about the varied career and entrepreneurship of Paul Revere.

Springfield-based programs featuring artists whose new work about the vision of W.E.B. Du Bois will be exhibited at the Umass Amherst Museum of Contemporary Art.

Three one-hour radio segments taking a look at civility (and the lack thereof) in public discourse.

French-Canadian historical re-enactors take part in a public commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the treaty that ended the French and Indian Wars.

An exhibit and programs exploring the history and culture of Carnival in eight communities in Europe and the Americas.

A video installation about how Old Ironsides was built by skilled boatwrights, focusing on the all important axe.

Three days of varied programs with multiple literary collaborators including authors of national repute.

Six public events-in the Berkshires, Roxbury, Cambridge, Medford, Watertown and Worcester-that explore the unfinished business of the Civil War and the civil rights era.

A community-based oral history/musical theatre project drawn from personal interviews within the Latino community in Lawrence, collected by Spanish-speaking students at Merrimack College, and dramatized by playwright Jose Cruz Gonzalez.

Two-months of community programming on the history and contemporary role of censorship in our society, using Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" as the centerpiece.

Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester will bring reproductions of regional landscape paintings from the Museum collection to seniors in care facilities in and around Gloucester, and also to support field trips for these seniors to the museum.

Development of a play that tackles issues in the history of women's work, based on the life of the strong-willed Mildred E. Walker, box office manager at the Academy whose controversial promotion to interim manager became the occasion of a scandal, criminal accusations, and the loss of her job.

A three-day workshop to introduce local teachers to the significant Civil War resources at the Center, and work with them in preparing to create lesson plans on the topic.

A weeklong workshop between beginner musicians from a selection of Hill Towns (Ashfield, Plainfield, Hawley, and Buckland) and mentors conversant in regional folk classics in preparation for storytelling performances.

The fourth annual history fair on the Boston Common for third and fifth grade students. The fair has grown into an annual collaboration between FPG, the schools, and various history organizations that interpret, re-enact, and engage students in how the Common has been used throughout history.

Four dinner concerts and 10 lunchtime concerts, to be followed by scholar-facilitated discussions at the Center, a community organization that serves homeless and low-income people.