Preparing History for the Future: Connecticut Humanities Council

With the end of the Cold War, Connecticut suffered a major economic recession thanks to a slump in arms, helicopter, and submarine sales—all previously vital industries in the state. By the mid-1990s, the phrase “cultural heritage tourism” began being bandied about by various public and private agencies eagerly seeking a solution to the fiscal dilemma. And that suited many players just fine—especially those in the arts who had always received the generous support of state and corporate funders. But now tourism officials were touting the possibility of finding economic relief through the promotion of Connecticut’s historical heritage and that’s where Bruce Fraser, executive director of the Connecticut Humanities Council (CHC), saw a fundamental flaw.

“I found myself sitting in tourism meetings regularly asking the tourism folks just how they could imagine that these institutions could be capable resources for the industry given their sorry situation and meager prospects for improvement,” explains Fraser. “How...could they imagine a major new economic initiative of considerable significance to the state without either a sophisticated sense of product or a clear plan of product development?”

The obvious answer was to help the state’s struggling heritage attractions develop better products for visitors. With whose money, you ask? Well, CHC felt it was time the state gave some funding to its historical assets. In fact, CHC believed that promoting history as a tourism commodity warranted funding from the industry itself and proposed that the state’s existing 12 percent lodging tax should be the source of revenue for cultural heritage tourism development.

Through aggressive lobbying and with the support of the state museum association, historical societies, tourism districts, and the Connecticut Lodging and Attractions Association, CHC succeeded in getting the General Assembly to establish the Cultural Heritage Development Fund (CHDF) in 1995. The fund receives an annual $1 million allocation for the purpose of making Connecticut’s cultural heritage a significant resource for the tourism industry.

Beginning in 1996, the CHDF gave grants to historical societies, museums, and other cultural institutions in four categories: technical assistance, professional development, planning, and implementation.  An economic impact study indicated that these grants provided a 10:1 return on that investment in spending by tourists in Connecticut.

By the time a decade had passed, program managers realized that the world had changed – new technologies created new entertainment options and consequently had affected audience expectations of what constituted a satisfactory cultural travel experience.

To address these changes, in 2006 CHC led a year-long “environmental scan” to review current thinking by leaders in the field of how museums and heritage sites need to operate to continue as important parts of the culture and of the tourism industry.

As a result, Fraser says, “the CHC significantly revised the Cultural Heritage Development Fund, renaming it the Heritage Revitalization Fund to make clear its new focus.”

The revised structure allocates over half of the $1 million annual funding to organizational stabilization. Grant options focus on activities such as audience assessment projects and their impact on new programming, visitor service reviews, museum and school partnerships, management changes and creation of new business plans. The remaining funding is used to fund projects that emerge from that self-study process.

“There is no retreat from our original agenda here,” Fraser notes. “We still see the programming of these institutions as important supporting components of the state’s tourism industry, but it’s clear to us that they will stay that way only if they successfully meet these new challenges and continue to offer ‘product’ that successfully illuminates Connecticut’s rich sense of place.”

Since the first grant round in 1996, the fund has reached over 250 of the state’s heritage organizations with grants totaling more than $11 million. Grants were matched by more than $12.4 million from grantees including corporate and foundation gifts, organizational match (staff salaries, equipment, etc.) and in-kind contributions from community organizations and volunteers.

For further information, visit the Connecticut Humanities Council or email.

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