Chicago Botanic Garden

Education — Lenhardt Library

Grants Received by the Lenhardt Library

Supporting the digitization and preservation of  45 rare botanical volumes

The Chicago Botanic Garden's Lenhardt Library was recently awarded a $172,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to fund a project that will digitize and preserve 45 rare and unique botanical volumes, dating from the late sixteenth to the early twentieth century, which will be made publicly accessible via the Illinois Digital Archives. This project will enhance access to a unique cultural treasure by contributing rare volumes of educational value and public interest to the nation's collection of digital works in the humanities.

Read more about this grant.

Save America's Treasures

“Save America’s Treasures,” a federal government program that helps conserve significant U.S. cultural and historic treasures, recently awarded the Chicago Botanic Garden a $55,000 grant to help preserve its rare books collection. This award is given by a consortium that includes the National Endowment for the Humanities, The President’s Committee on the Arts & Humanities, the Institute of Museum & Library Services, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Park Service. The Garden was the only location in Illinois to receive a grant this year.

Library Services and Technology

The Lenhardt Library was recently awarded a $25,000 Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) grant from Secretary of State and State Librarian Jesse White for its Serial Cataloging Project, which will catalog historic journals acquired from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society in 2002. LSTA grants are designed to assist librarians in identifying and funding specific local needs. They also provide funds to libraries that support cataloging services.

“With this grant we will be able to catalog approximately 700 historic journals, making them available for Illinois residents,” said Leora Siegel, director of the Lenhardt Library. “Cataloging is the first step toward future conservation and digitizing projects, which will further public access to these journals.”

Conservaton Bookshelf from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS)

The Chicago Botanic Garden’s Lenhardt Library was awarded 16 books from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Connecting to Collections Bookshelf. The Bookshelf is intended to provide small and mid-sized libraries and museums with essential, permanent resources needed to improve the condition of their collections. The books are to be used as a reference tool for those who are caring for our nation’s collections.