Back in 2009 I took a ten week business class. It’s know as MERIT. (MERIT is an acronym for a whole mess of words, which I can’t remember offhand.) While working towards my goal of establishing a non-profit dedicated to family history research, I discovered an initiative by the IRS, called Cyber Assistant, to automate [...]
Archive for the ‘Center for the Study of Family History’ Category
My Great Uncle
Posted: November 12, 2010 in Center for the Study of Family History, HAY, South DakotaIn early September, with a couple of friends help, I interviewed (on video) my great uncle, who turned 95 this summer. It was partly inspired by StoryCorps and my goal of starting a non-profit (the Center for the Study of Family History) focused on genealogy, saving family items of historical interest, and retelling the stories [...]
Plant goodness, harvest the fruit of loyalty, and plow the ground of knowledge.” Yesterday, while at the city library, I picked up an old copy of Daughters, the newsletter of the DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution). There are all sorts of magazines and reading material laying on a bench free for the taking. Most [...]
This is the last section, part eight, of the presentation for the MERIT class, which was edited and compressed because of time contraints and technical problems. Projects The first project is a book, tentatively titled Somewhere in France, about a soldier’s experiences on the Western Front during World War I. It will follow his family life [...]
Staff Hiring staff will be another important element in success or failure. Attending the ‘Nonprofits 101’ sessions has helped clarify what’s critical. Two positions stand out: Executive Director and Development Director. Center staff will be responsible for submitting grant applications to foundations such as the Meyer Memorial Trust and the Parks Education Foundation. This will [...]
Other Institutions The most well-known libraries in this genre are the Family History Library in Salt Lake City and the Allen County Public Library in Indiana. Brigham Young University has an extensive digital collection of books related to family history, the BYU Family History Library. The Godfrey Memorial Library in Connecticut is popular because of [...]
And here is part five of the business presentation. Research Doing a search at GuideStar for nonprofits in Salem gives a list of 2,069 such groups. The Willamette Heritage Center, which is the name resulting from the merger of the Marion County Historical Society (MCHS) and Mission Mill Museum, is one of the largest in [...]
Here is part four. Partnerships Attaching the Center to an academic institution is ideal, for office space and any other support, which will most likely be as in-kind contributions. Obviously the Center already has a relationship with Chemeketa Community College via the MERIT program and the resources of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC). And [...]
This is part three of the presentation. Sources of Funding Government agencies, particularly federal, provide grants of all kinds. The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is notable for giving money to authors. Most are associated with academia. Yet, there is an ‘Independent Scholars’ category and in 2009 the NEH awarded NEH grant information is [...]
This is the second part of the business presentation. Regulatory Compliance The IRS (Internal Revenue Service) is perhaps the most crucial government agency for nonprofits and has a good section on its site for information. The Center will be a 501(c)(3) educational organization. Using GuideStar, the overall grouping for the Center will be ‘Arts, Culture, [...]
