Museum receives Humanities Montana CARES Act relief funds

Carter County Museum recently received $5,000 through Humanities Montana's CARES grant program. This rapid-response funding provides general operating support to cultural organizations in the state that have been affected by the COVID-19 health crisis.

The museum will use this funding to support the Junior Scientist program and to develop a series of at-home educational kits, which families can check out on loan from the museum beginning June 29. These programs include materials and activities, ranging from ecology explorations, investigating rock art at Medicine Rocks State Park, making sundials at home, and more. Reservations can be made on the museum's website: https://cartercountymuseum.org/product-category/at-home-kits/ , in person at the museum, or by calling 406-775-6886. All kits are free, but there are limited quantities. If a kit is overdue, the borrower will be charged a $5 fee per week.

The funds are part of the CARES Act passed by Congress in March. The $2 trillion aid package included $75 million for the National Endowment for the Humanities, approximately $30 million of which was sent to fifty-six state and territorial humanities councils to redistribute to humanities nonprofit organizations in need.

The state humanities councils were chosen to distribute these funds because of their well-established relationships with museums, historical societies, libraries and cultural institutions that are the cornerstones of some of the most vulnerable and hardest to reach communities.

Humanities Montana is Montana's state humanities council with a mission to serve communities through stories and conversation. The council offers experiences that nurture imagination and ideas by speaking to Montanans' diverse history, literature and philosophy. Established in 1972, it is one of fifty-six councils across the nation that the National Endowment for the Humanities created in order to better infuse the humanities directly and effectively into public life. The council produces, funds, creates and supports humanities-based projects and programs, eye-opening cultural experiences and meaningful conversations.