A Note from Missouri Preservation
Dear Members and Friends,
It has been a challenging time of navigating uncharted waters in the past six weeks as our staff has been hunkered down and following social distancing and shelter in place orders due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We have been safely working from our respective home offices, and that has served us well during this difficult time for all of us. Although Governor Parson has started the first phase of reopening the state’s economy allowing for large gatherings and business openings, our office is located within the City of St. Louis, which still has opted for more stringent measures. Therefore, the Missouri Preservation office will continue to be closed until a new directive is given by Mayor Krewson. We continue to be available to you by phone at (660) 882-5946 or email Administrator Riley Price at admin@preservemo.org or Director Bill Hart at director@preservemo.org.
Because of the perceived dangers of spreading the coronavirus through meeting in large groups, we have decided to make some further revisions to two of our largest events — our Statewide Preservation Honor Awards and the Missouri Preservation Conference. Our Honor Awards ceremony and luncheon had been scheduled for April 21. With the current stay-at-home order it was moved to coincide with our Missouri Preservation Conference, scheduled for June 3-5 in Jefferson City. This is to inform you that both the Statewide Honor Awards and Conference (June 3-5, 2020) have been postponed. We will be working to conduct the Honor Awards later in the year, perhaps in December – and we will reschedule the Missouri Preservation Conference for the summer of 2021. In the meantime, we will look at offering alternative learning experiences, including the use of YouTube and Zoom.
If you are an Honor Award or Conference sponsor, or a trade show exhibitor, we will be in touch in the coming weeks about where to apply your pledge or make compensation for your sponsorship(s) or trade show exhibitor space. In the meantime, we appreciate your patience.
To celebrate May as National Preservation Month, we will be starting an online project, collecting photographs from amateur photographers of their favorite historic building or place in Missouri. In addition to the Preservation Month observance, we will continue accepting these photographs for use in an online (and possibly real time) exhibit, that will include prices, to commemorate Missouri’s bicentennial in 2021. These submissions will be called for both from our website and social media, including Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. We hope you’ll consider submitting your own photo to us at admin@preservemo.org.
We are so sorry to have to curtail our time with friends and family, and we can’t wait to see you all once this danger to public health and safety has passed. In the meantime, please be safe and stay healthy.
Riley Price,
Administrator
Bill Hart,
Executive Director