The Good Work
Preservation pursuits across the nation depend on support to the Campaign for America’s
Historic Places, now in its final push for $125 million.
BY HAP CONNORS
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With funds designated for the
Trust's historic sites, workers excavate the
cellar of Mount Pleasant, James Madison's grandfather's
house, c. 1732, on the grounds of Montpelier.
(Matthew Reeves, Montpelier Foundation)
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In 1995, the nation’s only congressionally chartered
nonprofit preservation organization faced the loss
of millions of dollars in federal funding and a financial—as
well as organizational—crossroads. Seven years
later, a reinvented National Trust nears the successful
completion of its first comprehensive campaign as
the reinvigorated leader of America’s preservation
movement.
“The reinvention of the National Trust strengthens
our mission,” notes President Richard Moe, “and
the tragic events in our nation last year only gave
our work more relevance.” That work is the preservation
of the great and humble places from America’s
past, the places in which Americans live, vote, worship,
learn to think, and learn to be part of a community.
Years of uncertain congressional appropriations that
also muffled the Trust’s advocacy voice persuaded
the organization’s board that the best course
for the future would be 100 percent private support.
“We decided to quit seeking federal funding for
several reasons,” Moe says. “We wanted to
be independent, we wanted financial certainty, and
we wanted to be more effective advocates in Congress.
I believe we’ve accomplished all of these things.”
Following two years of intensive planning, the Trust
in 1997 mounted its first comprehensive fundraising
drive, the Campaign for America’s Historic Places.
Nancy Campbell of New York City and Williamsburg,
Va., who was completing her term as chairman of the
board of trustees, stepped into the role of campaign
chairman. Campbell joined Moe and others in calling
on long-time Trust supporters while also introducing
new friends to the organization’s work. In 1999,
the Trust’s 50th-anniversary year, the drive
moved into a public phase. Initially, the campaign
was designed to raise $105 million in support of the
Trust, but new preservation opportunities and the
strong response from members led the board to raise
the goal. To date, the campaign has brought in nearly
$115 million toward a $125 million goal.
The work of the Trust continues throughout this financial
transition. Last year, with members’ support
to the campaign, the Trust lent a combined $700,000
to community efforts nationwide, including a citizens’
group that was revitalizing an inner-city Indianapolis
neighborhood and a group in Winston-Salem, N.C., that
was converting an old African-American schoolhouse into a community center and museum.
The Trust awarded nearly $530,000 in grants to 172
preservation projects and funded efforts to save historic
treasures threatened by natural disasters or demolition.
This year, again with members’ support, the Trust
continues to fight for passage of the Historic Homeownership
Assistance Act to expand tax credits for the rehabilitation
of residential properties in historic neighborhoods.
Directing some of its advocacy prestige on behalf
of North America’s oldest continuing culture,
the Trust named two Native American sacred sites to
its list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic
Places and joined the Sacred Sites Coalition, which
works to ensure that federal and state agencies entrusted
with managing public lands follow historic preservation
laws.
Nancy Campbell and the Trust’s development office,
headed by Executive Vice President David Brown, recognized
that the organization was historically undercapitalized
to support this work—one effect of reliance upon
annual congressional appropriations since the 1960s.
As a measure of the organization’s financial
sea change, from 1995 to 2001 the Campaign for America’s
Historic Places coupled with market appreciation boosted
the Trust’s overall endowment from $54 million
to $102 million. Permanent funding from this endowment
will partially offset the lost federal appropriation.
Like other successful nonprofits, the Trust relies
in its campaign on a combination of funding strategies
beyond endowment growth, using unrestricted gifts
to support and amplify gifts directed to specific
programs and projects.
The funds raised from Trust members and friends
during the campaign will be used as follows:
$71 million, or approximately 57 percent of the
$125 million goal, will support the Trust’s preservation
programs and ongoing administrative responsibilities.
These funds will most directly secure the Trust’s
financial independence by increasing its endowment
of unrestricted funds by a minimum of $25 million.
The gifts to the Trust in this category, those
not earmarked for specific programs, underwrite
the fundamental work of the organization, from much
of the Trust’s work in Congress to legal assistance
for grassroots preservation groups to publication
of Preservation magazine, winner in 1998 of the
nation’s top magazine publishing award. Recently,
this unrestricted support made possible the negotiated
transfer of oil leasing rights at Weatherman Draw,
Mont., from Anschutz Oil Exploration Corp. to the
Trust, protecting a sacred site on public land from
the inevitable desecration caused by drilling operations.
$29.4 million will support preservation and
education at the Trust’s historic sites. These
21 buildings, open to the public, depend on the
work of architects, archaeologists, carpenters,
electricians, administrators, curators, educators,
and maintenance personnel. The campaign will ensure
the Trust’s ability to address immediate structural
needs, train staff, and make plans for the future.
Donors to the Trust sites have assisted in a variety
of ways. A recently completed $9 million Kresge
challenge grant, including $675,000 from the Kresge
Foundation, supports technology and education at
the sites. A $2.5 million National Endowment for
the Humanities challenge fund endowed public education
programs connected with each site. A seven-figure
gift from John and Neville Bryan and the Sara Lee
Corp. endowed collections acquisition and curatorial
services through the John and Neville Bryan Director
of Museum Collections position. And the Graham Gund
Architect at the National Trust is now a permanently
endowed position thanks to the generosity of the
noted Boston architect and former Trust trustee.
$15.8 million will support efforts in the
regional offices, where much of the Trust’s
work at the grassroots level takes place. National
Trust Council member Daniel Thorne’s seven-figure
gift endows an intervention fund that allows the
staffs in the field to react to emergencies. Closely
tied to the regional offices is the network of professionally
staffed city-based and statewide partner organizations,
which has grown from 17 to more than 40 over the
seven years since its founding. Trust-administered
challenge grants have supported the hiring of these
staff members, and a seven-figure gift from Richard
Driehaus makes the Preservation Partnerships program
initiative possible.
$9.2 million will support community revitalization
efforts. In recent years the Trust has expanded the
part of its staff dedicated to helping local governments
and community development corporations revitalize
historic neighborhoods. The National Main Street Center,
now aligned with other Trust community revitalization
efforts, credits its 22 years of fostering entrepreneurial
self-help in smaller communities with creating 227,000
new jobs and 56,000 new businesses, preserving 89,000
historic buildings, and producing about $39 in new
investment for every dollar spent on community revitalization.
This year, the Trust and the John S. and James
L. Knight Foundation joined forces to provide eight
communities with $3.2 million in grants, loans,
equity funds, and technical assistance in economic
development tied to preservation. In all, 26 Knight
Foundation communities are eligible to apply for
grants over a three-year period.
“the campaign for america’s Historic
Places is designed to position the National Trust
as the leader that America’s preservation movement
needs and deserves,” Nancy Campbell says. “We
have the opportunity to instill a preservation ethic
in all Americans, but to do so will require the
support of all our members. We’ve been greatly
encouraged by the many friends across the country
who have stepped forward to support the Trust so
far.”
“Through this campaign, we have changed the
culture of the organization and reinvented the Trust,”
says Richard Moe. “Today, the Trust is much
more focused on its mission. It is more entrepreneurial
and, I believe, more effective than it has been
at any other time in its history.”
As the five-year campaign nears the final push
to reach the $125 million goal, all the members
of the Trust have the opportunity to contribute
to its success—and the future of preservation
in America.
To support The Campaign for America’s
Historic Places, visit www.nationaltrust.org.
Read more from our current
issue online, look for the
September/October 2002 issue of Preservation
on newsstands, or e-mail
us to purchase a copy.
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