Annual Report 2005-2006
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V I R G I N I A F O U N D A T I O N F O R T H E H U M A N I T I E S ANNUAL REPORT 2005-2006 V I R G I N I A F O U N D A T I O N F O R T H E H U M A N I T I E S www.virginiafoundation.org Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. — Robert F. Kennedy President’s Letter ...............................2 Programs and Projects ......................4 VFH Grants ........................................14 VFH Fellows ......................................20 VFH Donors .......................................21 Statement of Financial Position ......28 VFH Board and Staff .........................29 Two years ago Encyclopedia Virginia was an idea; one year ago at it was a promise; today it is building the Virginia Foundation for the in energy. Now the currents flow in Humanities (VFH). A strong sense two directions. Some people are of mission and an excitement about researching, writing, and designing the future charge our work. It is an the database of knowledge about exciting mission to help individuals, Virginia culture and history, while organizations, and communities others are envisioning its structural harness their ideas and raw energy underpinnings. Our goal is to make to understand the past, confront this website fun and easy for all to important issues in the present, and use, no matter their age or their shape a promising future. In many computer savvy. ways, we see our role as that of catalyst, turning untapped power The VFH African American into ideas and actions that matter. Heritage program continues to pulse with activity, notably the An electric turbine not only collects Fayette Area Historical Initiative in the power; it amplifies it. So it is with Martinsville, Virginia, through which the VFH Grant program, which VFH has been working with local empowers museums, libraries, residents to reclaim, display, and and civic groups celebrate all-but-forgotten details of Perhaps no kind to carry out the rich African American culture of energy is more the programs that animates Martinsville’s past important than needed by their and present. human energy — communities. VFH grantees Like the pistons of an engine, this that vital life force become part of a year the Virginia Folklife program that sustains statewide network converted the energy of many of and animates our of humanities Virginia’s traditional artists into CDs organizations and from “The Crooked Road: Virginia’s very being. scholars, finding Heritage Musical Trail.” Concerts resources that would not otherwise and recordings filled the air with be available. music and song from the eastern slopes of the Blue Ridge to the Like a windmill which channels coalfields of Southwest Virginia. the boisterous power of wind and converts it to usable energy, the VFH State-of-the-art radio studios channels the energies of scholars have allowed us to use the medium through the VFH Fellowship of radio even more effectively to program, resulting in the creation of channel the ideas and energy of new books and scholarly resources. Virginia and broadcast them to the larger world. Music and dialogue, our website, and talk with our staff special events, feature reporting and with the people near and far — from studios in Charlottesville, we working on the projects we help power research and ideas that reach fund or manage. New projects and far and wide. participants keep coming our way, while our steady successes — our In May, at the invitation of the China grants and fellowships, book events Association for International Friendly and humanities projects — keep Contact, several VFH staff members the foundation moving, producing, embarked on a cultural mission reaching out to find that native to China. Visiting this ancient land energy, in Virginia and beyond, informed our ongoing conversation on which our work and our about the role and value of the successes depend. humanities in society. We returned with a much clearer idea of how to think cross-culturally, to appreciate the diversity in our cultures, and Robert C. Vaughan, III to understand our shared humanity President despite different languages, histories, and ethnicities. We hope to suggest ways to establish ongoing In many ways, we bilateral exchanges, to get a sense see our role as that of real people in real life situations, of catalyst, turning and to build friendships and possible future collaborations. untapped power into ideas and Perhaps no kind of energy is more actions that matter. important than human energy — that vital life force that sustains and animates our very being. Our donors and supporters supply the life-force for the VFH. Without the essential financial contributions they provide, none of this would be possible. To them we say a resounding, “Thank you!” Such entrepreneurial energy is at work at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities — you can feel it in the air as you enter our building, attend our meetings, visit Genius is that energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates. Paul Wagner, an Academy Award winning writer- — Samuel Johnson producer-director of documentary and dramatic films. A guest on VFH Humanities Feature Bureau. The power of sound waves engages minds and enhances lives. stations across the country are Broadcast now airing VFH-created feature Voices, stories, opinions, and ideas stories during national broadcasts stream through the airwaves from of “All Things Considered” and VFH’s studios in Charlottesville. “Morning Edition.” “With Good Reason,” broadcast weekly by Virginia’s Public Radio But you don’t need a radio to tune stations, reaches more listeners in to “With Good Reason” or the than ever before. Weekly program Humanities Features. VFH Radio audience numbers are up, and has supercharged its website, so that’s just part of the power surge. computer-based listeners around As of last September, VFH Radio’s the world can download audio Humanities Feature Bureau has or transcript versions of past been up and running, with reporters broadcasts — a wealth of knowledge generating Virginia stories for free to anyone with computer access. drivetime broadcast. Public radio www.withgoodreasonradio.org SOUTHERN HUMANITIES MEDIA FUND AWARDS 2005-2006 “American Creole: Shades of Rhythm” Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting, Baton Rouge, LA $33,000 to produce a documentary about a southeastern Louisiana “Creoles of Color” family of musicians as they deal with questions of identity relating to their place in the family, their culture and contemporary society “Anne Braden” Appalshop, Inc., Whitesburg, KY $33,000 to produce a documentary about the life of social activist Anne Braden and the struggle for human rights in the South “Greensboro: A Study in Truth and Justice” Downtown Community TV Center, New York, NY $33,000 to produce a documentary exploring the Greensboro Massacre of 1979 and its aftermath Encyclopedia Virginia will Encyclopedia provide students, teachers, It used to be that “encyclopedia” scholars, travelers, and business meant a shelf full of books, but this professionals quick and easy year at VFH, the word has taken access to information about on a new meaning: a vibrant and Virginia’s history and culture. dynamic electronic collection of knowledge about Virginia. That is Having hired the managing and what Encyclopedia Virginia is shaping associate editors, recruited the up to be, with VFH as the central first section editors and writers, node of a living knowledge system. and selected a technology design firm,Encyclopedia Virginia is Drawing upon multiple collections well on its way towards its debut of text, imagery, and media in 2007. Turning raw energy into art may lead to solace and understanding. This year VFH published the Violence and second volume of Tough Times Companion, a collection of works Survival by victims and survivors. With Raw fury or frightened energy can tear contents that are raw and real, through the lives of those living amid beautiful and compelling, Tough political chaos or personal trauma. Times is available free to shelters, VFH’s Institute on Violence and hospitals, prisons, and counseling Survival helps to gather up that energy centers — places where it will help and sculpt it into meaningful expression. others to find energy for renewal. for them, for the Europeans Heritage who came here and for the land As the 2007 Jamestown they claimed as their own. A Commemoration approaches, partnership between the Virginia VFH is directing energy and Council on Indians, the tribes of attention toward Virginia’s Native Virginia, and the VFH, the Virginia Americans, past and present. Indian Heritage Program is now gaining steam, its overarching goal The founding of the Virginia colony to amplify the voices of today’s sent a lightning charge through the Virginia Indians and to honor, lives and communities of people research, and chronicle the part already resident in this land, their ancestors played in the changing the course of history history of the state. Researching community history can be a catalyst for building community. The partnership between the VFH Barton and Fayette Streets, the part African American Heritage Program of the city considered the gateway and the Fayette Area Historical to Martinsville’s spirited Black Initiative of Martinsville has been community from the 1920s to the a catalyst for building community 1960s. Teachers’ institutes, a new as residents have contributed roadside historical marker, two vintage photographs and recaptured exhibitions, and a 120-page pictorial memories from times gone by.