Battlefield Preservation Planning Grants: The 2023 Year in Review

Armed conflict runs through American history, reshaping both the land and countless lives, and it has shaped Americans' shared memory. To understand that legacy and help preserve it, the National Park Service's American Battlefield Protection Program runs four grant programmes for historic battlefields and related sites of armed conflict.

The broadest, Preservation Planning Grants, pays for community-led care of historic battlefields and associated sites. In 2023 the programme worked to make the grants better known, holding several webinars and giving technical help to prospective applicants throughout the year. By the deadline it had received 23 applications.

Who was funded

The programme awarded over $1.2 million to 10 recipients, 43 percent of eligible applicants:

• nonprofits, 60 percent (a larger share of the money also went to nonprofits than in the previous round, an increase of 42 percent);
• state governments, 20 percent;
• local governments, 10 percent;
• institutions of higher education, 10 percent.

What the money pays for

• archaeological survey: 7 projects;
• geographic survey and mapping: 3;
• an interpretation plan, a cultural resource study and a preservation plan: 1 each.

The projects are in 13 states — Alaska, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and Wyoming — and, in a wider spread than before, 46 percent lie west of the Mississippi River.

The 2023 Preservation Planning Grants in figures. NPS / Hannah Thomas.

The programme can explain eligibility and its competitive merit review by email or by phone at 202-513-7126.

Corrected: the NPS article captions its infographic as "Battlefield Land Acquisition Grant statistics"; the infographic shows the Preservation Planning Grants.

Sources

• National Park Service, American Battlefield Protection Program, "2023 Preservation Planning Grant Year in Review." https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/ppg-2023-year-in-review.htm
• Preservation Planning Grants: https://www.nps.gov/orgs/2287/preservation-planning-grants.htm