Museum receives NEH grant

By Kristen Baumgartner

The de Saisset Museum received a grant for more than $250,000 last month to help finance high-density storage units that will preserve the thousands of artifacts in the museum's collection.

The new installment will make the museum's collection much more accessible for teaching and outreach purposes, said de Saisset Director Rebecca Schapp.

The de Saisset received the grant from the Preservation and Access division of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) only after multiple requests.

"We applied for the grant three times, starting in 1999," said Schapp. "Each submission took a year to evaluate, so, as they say, the third time is a charm."

Although the entire project costs over $500,000, the grant significantly helped to decrease costs and de Saisset will now be able to balance the difference.

The museum currently houses its artifacts on the same shelves and cabinets that were put in place 48 years ago during the building's original construction. The collection is spread throughout seven separate areas on three levels of the museum, making access to and removal of some objects difficult.

The new system will consolidate, organize and stabilize de Saisset's collection within a large, secure and environmentally controlled storage area.

"These improvements will allow the museum to preserve the objects with the highest integrity to better serve the public that wishes to view and study them," said Schapp.

"[The new organization] will explode our capacity," said de Saisset Curator of Collections Management Jean MacDougall.

Freshman anthropology major Liz Rosenbaum said that the grant will bring many opportunities to the museum.

"The de Saisset has an amazing collection and such a variety of objects with the potential to be utilized in many diverse ways," said Rosenbaum, a student docent and public relations assistant at the museum. "This reorganization will truly allow for this to happen."

The grant was awarded after a competitive national application process, the result of an initiative that President George W. Bush announced last fall. This NEH initiative was designed to award grants to institutions that explore significant events and themes in U.S. history.

"[The grants] will broaden access to significant documents, support scholars and teachers, and deepen our understanding of our nation and the world in which we live," said NEH Chairman Bruce Cole.

NEH awarded more than $25 million to 288 accomplished applicants, divided into four types of programs. The Preservation and Access program received the largest portion of funds-over $18 million-and the de Saisset was one of only 63 recipients within this program.

Sophomore art history and communication major Davina Camardo, another student docent at de Saisset, said that the museum is beautiful and prestigious and the grant will take it to an even higher level.

The project began on May 1 and will take two years to complete. Schapp said that the museum is delighted to have received this award and the Santa Clara community and beyond will benefit from the new system starting fall quarter of 2005.