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Point, click, donate

By Loren Keller

Supporters of the flood-ravaged African American Historical Museum and Cultural Center of Iowa in Cedar Rapids are hoping to raise $20,000 for the museum in a three-day online fundraiser set to begin Friday.

Five feet of floodwater inundated the museum at 55 12th Ave. SE on June 13 and caused an estimated $720,000 in damage, says C. Paschal Eze, a Coralville resident and museum volunteer who is leading the museum’s Aug. 22-24 Count Me In fundraising campaign.

Insurance is expected to cover just $70,000 of the damage.

“Of course $20,000 is a far cry from several hundred thousands dollars but every little amount helps,” says Eze, an immigrant from West Africa who works as a training consultant at Reputation Training International.

“All we want is for people to point, click and donate as little $20, or as high as their compassion can take them… We’ve gotten encouraging responses from people as far away as Scotland, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands.”

Donors who contribute at least $20 will receive an e-book edition of A Matter of Black Transformation by Michigan Chronicle senior editor Bankole Thompson.

Tom Moore, the museum’s executive director, says 90 percent of the museum’s collection was saved and that the facility is now clean and dry.

“A huge job of restoration lies before us but we are determined to rebuild at our current location,” he writes on the museum’s web site.

The museum plans to reopen in January with an exhibit based on the historical town of Buxton, Iowa, a Mahaska County coalmining community in the early 20th century known as “the black man’s utopia.” The exhibit was originally scheduled to open this month.

Moore says the museum’s permanent collection will be “totally redesigned” and reopened in December 2009.

Despite losing its building, museum staff are continuing several programs including "Museum Without Walls" presentations and classes, "History in the Park,” college fairs, exhibits and oral histories in communities across Iowa. Upcoming events include Juneteenth and the Annual Women's Conference.

Administrative offices have been temporarily relocated to the Masonic Library in Cedar Rapids.

“I would be delighted to see the museum get back to where it was,” says Paschal. “I have been privileged to visit the museum a couple times and see young people from grade schools come there to support it. You need to see the glow on their faces as they come out. And I think that should continue. Young people deserve to keep abreast of our history and of course have the opportunity to better understand the present and realistically shape the future.”