Center of Southwest Studies : Support Us

Donate

The Center welcomes and depends upon donations of items and collections that fit the parameters of our Collection Management Policy. The Center also welcomes cash gifts to facilitate special projects, internships and to further the mission of this vital cultural resource institution.

Donation FAQ's and Forms
FAQ's about donating personal papers and records
Deed of Gift Form
Image Metadata Intake Form
Permission to Reproduce
Permission to Use a Literary Work
Temporary Custody Receipt Form
Loan to the Center Form
Loan from the Center Form

To donate artifacts, please contact the Curator of Collections, Jeanne Brako.
To donate personal papers and records, please contact the Archives Manager, Nik Kendziorski.
To donate book collections, please contact the Reference Librarian, Elayne Silversmith.
To donate charitable contributions, please contact the Director, Kevin Britz.

Join

Be a charter member of the new Center of Southwest Studies! For the first time in its history, the Center of Southwest Studies is pleased to offer you the opportunity to officially join us as we embark on an exciting new era of programs, exhibits like and other educational adventures. Upcoming major exhibits will be on a diverse number of topics such as the ranching heritage of the Southwest, the frontier military and old Fort Lewis, the history of southwest eating, the story of mining, films, and coyotes.
We are offering different levels to choose from - each with great benefits.

A basic $55 annual member enjoys these benefits:

Free parking at the Center (if you are not a Fort Lewis College Employee)
Advance notice of Center exhibit openings, programs, and events
Invitations to special member events
Subscription to our colorful new expanded Timelines publication
10% discount on retail items
10% discount on archival reproductions
Special eAnnoucements of Center news

As a $150 Sustaining member you will receive:

All the benefits listed above plus:
20% discount on archival services
Special behind-the-scenes tours
Invitation to special annual sustaining member event

A Basic Business Membership of $500 offers:

All the benefits listed above plus:
A free annual ad for your business in Timelines
Your website linked to the Center’s new website
Free meeting space twice a year

A Business Sponsorship of $1500 includes:

All the benefits list above plus:
Free meeting space four times a year
Special tours by staff for your special guests

The Patron Circle of the Center of $2000 or higher offers special benefits in addition to all the basic ones. These include exclusive behind-the-scenes and gallery tours, use of the newly remodeled Lupien Reception Room for very special events, and personalized tours.

Volunteer

Our commitment to preserve a record of Southwest history is limited by resources of staff, facilities and time. We strongly value our volunteers in continuing our work.

Preparing papers and records for use by researchers is the most expensive operation of a repository. Adults of all ages have found great satisfaction in helping the Center tackle a particular project. It might be photographing and inventorying a collection of artifacts, scanning in barcodes to be attached to objects, indexing a ledger or a newspaper, processing a small collection...the list goes on.

To inquire about volunteering:
Contact the Curator for museum and public programming projects.
Contact the Archives Manager for photographs, postcards, special collections and archival projects.

Archival Volunteer Booster Award
This award recognizes those who have given particular support to the archives and special collections at the Center of Southwest Studies. Recent awardees are:

Helen Bair, Bud Davis, and Paula Wiseman receive their awards from former archivist Todd Ellison.

Paula Wiseman and Bud Davis received the award in the Fall/Winter of 2006/07. Bud and Paula have been volunteering at the Center of Southwest Studies faithfully each Thursday for six years. Their contributions have included several major archival arrangement and description projects and museum artifact projects prior to that. In the fall of 2006 they finished a huge project of archivally arranging, housing and numbering thousands of Native American photos in the Theodore Hetzel collection. Helen Bair, a daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Hetzel, was acknowledged and thanked for her family's role in the Center's documentation of Native American history and culture.

Esther Greenfield hard at work.

Esther Greenfield, archival volunteer at the Center of Southwest Studies, was honored with the award in the Summer/Fall of 2007. Esther has a knack for connecting the historical record with personalities. Her first project with us was to catalog and scan her drawings of arborglyphs (aspen tree carvings) in the Durango area – which she had documented through her volunteer work for the San Juan Mountains Association - for the Center's website. Her current project is organizing, classifying and filing the many thousands of Western Colorado Power Company photographs from the early 20th century. Her research on arborglyphs and on Frank Fitchue, early black pioneer in Durango, has been published by the Durango Herald.

Jan Lips and Nina Heald Webber receive their awards from former archivist Todd Ellison.

The Fall of 2005 award went to Jan Lips (pictured far left), who brought her expertise, superb people skills, and attention to detail to the task of digitizing and producing textual data records for thousands of postcards that Nina Heald Webber (pictured in center) donated to the Center. Nina Heald Webber received the award in Winter 2005 for her gracious, thoughtful and generous contributions to the archival documentation of life and cultural resources in southwestern Colorado. She has compiled and donated a fabulous collection of postcards, photographs, ephemera and printed materials, funded the cataloging and digitization efforts of the Center, and provided foundational support for the publication of the book San Juan Sampler: Selections from the Nina Heald Webber Postcard Collection.

Each of these awards recognizes work that will benefit researchers worldwide for many years to come. We are truly grateful for the contributions of these individuals and we hope their work may prompt you, the reader, to contribute in appropriate ways to archival programs here at the Center of Southwest Studies or at a repository that is in your community.

Items for Sale

San Juan Sampler: Selections from the Nina Heald Webber Postcard Collection Durango, CO: Durango Herald Small Press, 2004. Winner of the Colorado Independent Publishers Association “Evvy” Book Award for 2005, and 2nd place winner in the Travel/Recreation category. Price: $17.95
Durango Collection® notecards. Posters and framed prints are also available. Prices: 5-card package: $10.00; 10-card package: $20.00; 12-card package: $24.00; matted cards: $10.00 each Make checks payable to the Fort Lewis College Bookstore.
Letters from a Weminuche Homestead, 1902 by Edith Taylor Shaw Durango, CO: Durango Herald Small Press, 2003. Price: $14.95
Southern Ute Lands, 1848-1899; The Creation of a Reservation by Gregory Coyne Thompson CSWS Occasional Paper No. 1, March 1927, 67 pgs. Price: $40
The Coming of Durango's Little Train by Robert W. Delaney 1973, 11 pgs. Price: $20
The Black on New Spain's Northern Frontier: San Jose de Parral, 1631 to 1641 by Vincent Mayer, Jr.; edited by Robert Delaney CSWS Occasional Paper No. 2, November 1974, 45 pgs. Price: $20
Adventures with the Anasazi of Falls Creek by Helen Sloan Daniels CSWS Occasional Paper No. 3, September 1976, 55 pgs. Price: $20
Fort Lewis College Archaeological Investigations in Ridges Basin, Southwest Colorado, 1965-1982 by Philip G. Duke CSWS Occasional Paper No. 4, 1985, 325 pgs. Price: $30