Manor Vail Society - Vail Museum Fundraiser 2011 DVD (321)

Archive

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Vail Museum

Name/Title

Manor Vail Society - Vail Museum Fundraiser 2011 DVD (321)

Entry/Object ID

2013.292.1

Scope and Content

Manor Vail Fundraiser 2011 DVD

Context

During 2010 and 2011, MVS discussed many ways to raise funds to build a new Vail Museum location on the Lyndon State College campus. A location was agreed upon by MVS and the Lyndon State College Administration. LSC gifted the space and a budget for an architect to design a new museum. The new space would be on the 3rd floor of the Theodore N. Vail Center, next to the Admissions Office. The old museum had an out of the way location with no windows and was locked almost all the time. It had no visibility and there wasn't much awareness among students that it even existed. The Manor Vail Society was tasked with raising the money to construct the new museum. Michael Thurston ’74, who joined MVS in 2011, produced this fundraiser video with help from Hannah Nelson Manley ’97, LSC Alumni Director. 1200 copies in self-mailers were fabricated by VIDEOSyncracies of South Burlington, VT and distributed to Vail era alumni by Lyndon State College. At the time, that mailing list was just over 1100 strong. The video raised just shy of $25,000, and at the 11th hour, Jan Eastman, a local attorney and friend of LSC decided she would match, dollar for dollar, whatever the video generated in donations. The proceeds from the fundraiser video, coupled with the generosity of Jan Eastman's matching contributions, enabled MVS to construct the Vail Museum in its new location. When those funds didn't quite pay the total bill for construction, Jan Eastman wrote another check to cover the overrun. The new Vail Museum was completed during the summer of 2012 by Graves Builders of Barnet, VT, and was dedicated at Homecoming in September 2012 with a ribbon cutting celebration. On hand for the dedication was Dick Collins ’53, founding member of MVS, Jan Eastman, and Joe Bertolino, President of Lyndon State College. Also in attendance were many members of MVS and other alumni. As a side note, Vail Museum has a quantity of this DVD in its original sealed self-mailer in storage.

Cataloged By

Betty Beattie Bolevic & Maxine Gray Aldrich, Michael Thurston photos