Harriet Beecher Stowe Center Holds Preservation Event

The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center in Hartford held a ground-breaking ceremony on June 3 for its Collections Preservation Project, an initiative to secure the stewardship of the center’s historic collections of more than 200,000 items. The project will include installing fire suppression; upgrading HVAC; installing compact storage equipment; improving the roof; and adding insulation in the Stowe Center vault in time for the bicentennial of Stowe’s birth in 2011. The project, designated and funded as a “We the People” project by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is also supported by funding from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving; a “Save America’s Treasures” award from the National Park Service; and United Technologies Corporation. Pictured are, from left, Stowe Center Board Chair Christiana Gianopulos from Day Pitney LLP; U.S. Rep. John B. Larson; Katherine D. Kane, the center’s executive director; and Edward J. Forand Jr., vice chair of the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving’s board of directors.