Informal meeting began at 9:00 AM with attendees Juanita Hunt, Ann Leadbetter, Gwen Brodis, Marie Berry, Cindy DellaPenna, Donovan Bowley, Bunny Gleason and Margaret Morse.
Thanks were given to Marie Berry for her organization of the June 27th yard/bake sale, which took in $781.15.
It was agreed there will be no general membership meetings this year and since the bylaws read election of officers will be "in years ending in odd numbers", there is no issue with retaining our current officer roll. Margaret and Bunny who coordinate speakers will send out notes thanking those speakers lined up for this year and suggesting next year may be a better program year.
Donovan turned over a small voice recorder to Bunny. It is hoped she may be able to interview Viola Richardson this summer. The recorder can be used to record interviews with long time Hope residents.
There was a discussion regarding purchases for Hope Historical Society - sales tax should not be paid, as we are a tax-exempt organization. Gwen has arrangements with several local hardware stores who have the HHS number on file, so we need to coordinate with her on purchases.
Donovan has drawn up a handy spreadsheet to record specific volunteer hours. This makes it easy to zero in on hours spent performing various tasks around and for HHS. By recording our hours, we can better reflect our worthiness and need when applying for grant money. We could use a grant now for supplies. State grants typically run on a fiscal year, from July 1 - June 30. Donovan will check with his contact at the state, Heather Moran, to learn if there are any remaining grant monies for this year.
The discussion of grants leads to the need for a person or persons skilled at writing proposals. The writing takes time as does the research of databases to learn what grants may be available. This year is likely a very lean year due to Covid-19. Discussion of grants led to other HHS needs - such as, major structural repair between floors where the support wall had been removed between the dining room and living room years ago and tied in with the structural repair, rewiring. Any volunteers with grant writing skills?
We discussed donations. What is appropriate and what is not. How to handle and valuation determinations. Speaking of donations, we received of Betsy True, a beautiful hand sewed hunting outfit; her mother-in-law, Alice True, had sewn it for her son, William True, many years ago. We need a male manikin to display the suit. We also were given two dehumidifier/air conditioners from the Town of Hope Town Office. There would have to be rewiring and some plumbing work before they could be put to use, but they appear to be of high quality.
Gwen provided her Treasurer's Report which breaks down income and expenses from Sept. 30, 2019 to July 24, 2020. We took in $7,574.11 and spent $4,727.67.
HHS has been restocked, we now have a goodly supply of Cookbooks, A Taste of Hope, available for sale for $10 - there are 66 currently at the home and 3 available at Hope General Store. The book, An Array of Hope, Social News of Hope, Maine - 1888 to 1907, is also available at HHS for $45.
We recently had an inquiry from an out of state relative asking if we could update our cemetery
database. The lady provided a last name to two people we had listed with first names, but last name
unknown. With research, this provided our town Sexton with additional information for the Town's
records. Appreciation is extended to our current webmaster, Susan McIntyre, and her rapid update of
the database. Additionally, a huge shout out of appreciation for all the work done by our former
webmaster, Bob Appleby, who not only set up the database, but took photographs of most of the
gravestones, which makes identification so much easier.
The meeting was adjourned at about 11:00 AM.
Respectively submitted by
Cindy DellaPenna