Four Rivers: The Heritage Area of Annapolis, London Town & South County is pleased to announce four new mini-grant awards. Made possible for the fifth year through financial support from Anne Arundel County, the City of Annapolis, and the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority, Four Rivers’ matching mini-grants of up to $2,500 assist local heritage-related non-profit organizations in developing new heritage-related programs, activities, products, and events.

The Annapolis Maritime Museum and the Chesapeake 20 Association will receive $2,500 to support the development of educational materials, a website, and historic documentation for the Chesapeake 20, originally designed by Galesville’s Cap’n Dick Hartge in the 1930s. The Chesapeake 20 Association preserves, maintains, and sails both the wooden and the more recent fiberglass boats. Annapolis Maritime Museum and the Association will hold a public event next summer focusing on the historic significance and continuing popularity of this classic recreational sailboat class.

The Anne Arundel County Trust for Preservation will receive $2,500 for development of a virtual historic ship reconstruction and related educational materials at Historic London Town & Gardens. A 3D reconstruction of a circa 1747 transatlantic sailing vessel, Rumney and Long, built in Annapolis, will help educate visitors about the important role played by colonial transatlantic trade in this region.

The Banneker Douglass Museum and the Banneker Douglass Foundation will receive $2,500 to develop a technology based cell phone audio tour featuring five historic sites and archeology displays around the City of Annapolis. The exhibition, “Annapolis: Centuries of Community,” will be developed in collaboration with Historic Annapolis Foundation, the City of Annapolis, and the University of Maryland ’s Archeology in Annapolis program.

The Kunta Kinte-Alex Haley Foundation was awarded $2,500 for “I Dig Galesville Roots,” a multi-generational African-American history and genealogy project with the Galesville Community Center Organization. An outgrowth of the successful multigenerational “Roots” Camp program conducted by the Foundation last summer, the project will team youth with grandparents and other family elders to enhance appreciation of local history and genealogy.

Four Rivers will hold another mini-grant round in the spring of 2008. The deadline for submission of both new mini-grant proposals and annual Maryland Heritage Areas Authority (MHAA) grant proposals is Friday, March 7, 2008. Information on the spring grant round and previously awarded grants is available at www.fourriversheritage.org or by calling the Four Rivers Heritage Area office. FY2009 MHAA grant application forms are available at www.marylandhistoricaltrust.net. Spring mini-grant proposals will be evaluated by a Four Rivers Grants Committee, and mini-grant awards will be announced approximately one month after application deadline. MHAA grant proposals are evaluated by both the Four Rivers Grants Committee and the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority; FY09 MHAA awards will be announced next July.

For more information, please contact Executive Director Donna Dudley at 410-222-1805.