Between 2006 and 2010, institutions and individuals in Wyoming received $3.3 million from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Wyoming Humanities Council for projects that explore the human endeavor and preserve our cultural heritage. Below are some examples.
- Support from three grants totaling $452,000 enabled 240 Wyoming schoolteachers to attend oneweek seminars in which they visited historic landmarks and archives to study the struggle for women’s rights in the western states and territories, including Wyoming, where women gained the right to vote half a century before passage of the Nineteenth Amendment.
- The Laramie Plains Museum has received $22,000 in grants to help preserve its growing collection of textiles, art, and historic artifacts. The museum is housed in the historic Ivinson Mansion, which was built in the late nineteenth century for banker and erstwhile railroad-tie dealer Edward Ivinson
- The Sheridan County Library and the Natrona County Public Library have both received grants of $2,500 to support presentation of “Lincoln: The Constitution and the Civil War,” a traveling exhibition developed by the National Constitution Center.
- The Homesteader Museum, Powell, received a $5,000 grant to help preserve thousands of historic photos and artifacts depicting the town’s late pioneer days, the history of land reclamation, and Japanese internment during World War II.
- The Buffalo Bill Historical Center, in Cody (named after Buffalo Bill, whose real name was William F. Cody), received a $10,000 grant to reinterpret the great showman as both a product and a shaper of the popular image of the West.
- In the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) fought forest fires in Wyoming and helped save the country’s largest herd of elk. KCWC-TV, a PBS affiliate based in Riverton, received a $30,000 grant to support early planning of a documentary devoted to the history of the CCC.
- The Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum received a $10,000 grant to support consultations with scholars and museum professionals to bring new interpretations to bear on the museum’s exhibitions.
- Each semester, the Wyoming Humanities Council partners with five other cultural agencies to sponsor Saturday University in Jackson Hole, where students take free, college-level courses in such topics as “Who Pays for Climate Change?,” “Democracy: Lessons from Afghanistan and Iraq,” and “Theories of Punishment: What is Justice?”.
- Faces of Addiction: A Humanities Perspective featured screenings in seven Wyoming cities of films about different types of addiction.These were accompanied by discussions led by humanities scholars and professionals familiar with addiction issues.
- Since launching a Civility Matters initiative last fall, more than 1,280 people have attended nine public humanities council programs in Wyoming on topics of civility in education and politics, and forums on the Middle East, China, and genocide.