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2024 March Preservation ePost

Now Accepting Nominations!

Do you know of an individual, organization, agency, or project that exemplifies the best in historic preservation? Now is the time to recognize them! The Office of Historic Preservation (OHP) is accepting nominations for the 2024 Governor's Historic Preservation Awards. Application deadline: April 24, 2024.

Nominees can include, among others, rehabilitation, restoration, and adaptive reuse efforts; civic efforts or organizations that preserve, interpret, and educate about community history; and companies and public agencies that go above and beyond expected mandates. Efforts to address the challenges of climate change will be considered as well. Individuals whose passion for preservation has made a difference and saved numerous cultural, historical, and archaeological treasures may also be nominated.

For inspiration, visit our Past Award Recipients page. We look forward to receiving your nominations!

Capitol photo courtesy of Andre M/Creative Commons.

Grant Opportunities

T-Mobile Hometown Grants (T-Mobile, Main Street America, and Smart Growth America) provide funding to towns with a population of 50,000 or less, to support community revitalization projects such as adaptive reuse of historic buildings or creation of community gathering spaces, among others.

Application Deadline: March 31, 2024.

Partners in Documentation Program (Historic Preservation Education Foundation and Heritage Documentation Programs) is accepting proposals for grants to expand learning opportunities for students through the recording of historic structures and landscapes according to the standards of the Heritage Documentation Programs: Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS).

Proposal Deadline: May 1, 2024.

Heritage Amplified Grant Program (CyArk) provides grant recipients with an opportunity "to amplify place-based stories of cultural heritage through the development of a web-based 3D virtual experience." Potential applicants may register for a free, informational webinar on March 20, 2024, at 8:00 am PDT.

Application Deadline: May 6, 2024.

California Humanities Grant Programs (California Humanities) support a variety of efforts by nonprofits and public agencies to preserve and educate about California's richly diverse heritage.

Upcoming deadlines through November 2024 for a variety of grant programs.





Image courtesy of Scott Graham on UnSplash.

Preserving Stories of the Mother Road

Route 66, the Mother Road, will turn 100 in 2026. The historic highway was established in November 1926 and was one of the first highways in the country's numbered highway system. Route 66 quickly became a fixture in the life and imagination of American culture, showing up in songs, literature, movies, television, and many a family's vacation memories.

In the lead up to the Route 66 Centennial, the National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP) is collecting, sharing, and preserving stories of people's travels and experiences along the Mother Road. The goal is to collect 2,026 stories by the time of the centennial. You are invited to contribute to the collection!

Visit the NTHP Route 66 page to learn more about the story project and read some of the stories already submitted, and also about efforts to designate Route 66 as a National Historic Trail.





Image courtesy of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Among the first California properties to achieve National Register of Historic Places designation in 2024 was the Sierra City School in Sierra County, California. The wooden frame schoolhouse is one story, with side porches and entry vestibule, double hung sash windows, and a corrugated metal, front gabled roof, which replaced the original wooden shingle roof. The schoolhouse was constructed in 1883, expanded in 1887 and 1888, with a belfry added in 1888. The side porches were added in 1917.

The building is significant for its role as Sierra City’s only schoolhouse and for its importance as a community gathering space in the remote, Gold Rush era town. The first attempt at establishing a school in Sierra City occurred in 1863, when Hannah Riley established a short-lived private school in the Masonic Hall. After marrying John Scott, Hannah Scott became the first public school teacher in Sierra City, and in 1882 funding was approved to build the schoolhouse. The community supported the school via regular fundraising for expansion of the schoolhouse and addition of a belfry, and general repairs and maintenance.

A powerful avalanche damaged the building on January 10, 1952, making the school building unusable. That event, plus the town's small number of school children ultimately transferring to nearby Downieville schools, ended the building’s life as an education facility. In the ensuing years, the building was used as a store, art gallery, and public meeting space, and today, serves as a private residence. The Sierra City Schoolhouse was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on January 9, 2024.

Photo courtesy of Tom Butt.

State Historical Resources Commission

The State Historical Resources Commission (SHRC) meets quarterly each year. Commission meetings are open to the public and live-streamed through the Cal-Span network. Meeting dates, times, and agendas are posted to the SHRC Meeting Schedule and Notices page of the OHP website.

For upcoming nominations, visit the Pending Nominations page. Nominations already heard by the Commission are listed on the Actions Taken page, and video recordings of SHRC meetings are posted to Meeting Recordings & Summaries.



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