Today the Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms announced the launch of Blue Star Museums, a partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, Blue Star Families, and more than 600 other museums across America to offer free admission to all active duty military personnel and their families from Memorial Day through Labor Day 2010.

The Blue Star Museums program runs from Memorial Day, May 31 through to Labor Day, September 6, 2010.  The free admission program is available to active duty military and their immediate family members (military ID holder and five immediate family members), which includes active duty Reserve and active duty National Guard.

About Blue Star Families

Blue Star Families is a national, non-partisan, non-profit network of military families from all ranks and services including guard and reserve, with a mission to support, connect and empower military families.  In addition to morale and empowerment programs, Blue Star Families raises awareness of the challenges and strengths of military family life with civilian community and leaders.  Membership includes spouses, kids, parents, service members, veterans and civilians.

Operation Appreciation is an initiative of Blue Star Families that seeks to connect military families to the larger community.  Blue Star Families 2009 annual survey shows that 94 percent of military families feel that the larger community doesn’t truly understand or appreciate the sacrifices we make for the country.  Through initiatives such as Blue Star Museums, Blue Star Families provides avenues for the larger community to show that they do understand, in meaningful ways that enrich the lives of military service members, spouses, children and parents.  For more information, please visit BlueStarFam.org

About the National Endowment for the Arts

The NEA is a public agency dedicated to supporting excellence in the arts – both new and established – bringing the arts to all Americans, and providing leadership in arts education.  Established by Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government, the Arts Endowment is the largest annual national funder of the arts, bringing great art to all 50 states, including rural areas, inner cities, and military bases. For more information, please visit Arts.gov.

“America’s museums are proud to join the rest of the country in thanking our military personnel and their families for their service and sacrifice,” said National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman. “I cannot imagine a better way to do that than welcoming them in to explore and enjoy the extraordinary cultural heritage our museums present.”

The Stickley Museum is proud to partner with Blue Star Families and the National Endowment for the Arts on this nationwide project to show our appreciation for the sacrifices military families make and to offer them opportunities for education, entertainment, and family fun.

The Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms to Participate in Blue Star Museums is a post from The Stickley Museum At Craftsman Farms

We are making room for new holiday merchandise in the Museum Shop by holding our largest clearance sale in years. This is your chance to scoop up some favorites at up to 50% off! Sale items include tiles, books, gifts, pottery, note cards, baseball caps, teddy bears, copperware, and much more. Stop in soon because the early bird gets the biggest selection!

This sale runs through September 30 and is in-store only and not in our web shop. Items will return to full-price on October 1. Don’t miss your chance!

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We are pleased to share this wonderful opportunity with our readers. The RSVP deadline is April 1, so you will need to act quickly. You are invited to join Ted Bosley, Director of The Gamble House in Pasadena, California, for an architectural study tour exploring the Arts and Crafts movement in upstate New York during its most beautiful season! The fabulous, week-long experience entitled “Little Journeys to Roycrofters, Rustic Camps, and Buffalo,” will take place September 10-17, 2009.

Tour participants will visit East Aurora, home of the Roycrofters, as well as nearby Buffalo, where Frank Lloyd Wright’s Darwin Martin house, among other architectural gems, has been lovingly restored. Next stop is Lake Placid and other towns in the Adirondack Park for visits to the rustic “camps” that were turn-of-the-century resort homes of the wealthy.

A few spaces are still available and so we are pleased to share the news that the Gamble House has opened this exclusive tour to a wider family of friends like you, as long as space remains. The deadline for booking this tour is April 1, and it is limited to 24 participants.

Would you like to join the group? If so, now is the time to call Bobbi Mapstone at 626 395-9783 or e-mail her at mapstone@usc.edu. You will need to follow up with a deposit of $400 per person, with balance due August 1. Cost of tour: $2840 per person single occupancy; $410 per person single supplement. $200 is a tax deductible donation to the Gamble House. For more information, please visit their website at GambleHouse.org.

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We thought our readers would be interested to know that Elaine Hirschl Ellis of Arts & Crafts Tours has just reduced the prices of three 2009  English Arts & Crafts Tours:

Far From the Crowd: Retreats of Royalty, Writers and Artists in Kent, Sussex and the Isle of Wight is scheduled for May 9 – 17,  was originally $5,982 and is now $5,088;

J.W. Waterhouse: A Pre-Raphaelite’s London is scheduled for September 6 – 13, was originally $5,266 and is now $4,420;

MOBIA Benefactor’s Weekend in London is scheduled for October 16 – 20, was originally $4,977 and is now $3,746.

Elaine says they are mindful of the current economic situation and hope that the new prices will make these unique, small group, highly personalized tours more affordable and entice you to join us of one of these exceptional trips.

Full details on all of their wonderful tours are available on their website: www.artsandcraftstours.com; just click on Custom Tours and follow the links.  You may want to contact them directly  at artsandcraftstours@gmail.com to ensure you have the most recent details.

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A staged reading at the Grolier Club, New York

Wednesday, 19 November, 6 p.m.

The first American performance of Virginia Woolf’s comedy, Freshwater, will be held on Wednesday November 19th in New York’s Grolier Club. The play, a hilarious send-up of Woolf’s great-aunt, the famed photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, and her friends poet Alfred Tennyson, painter G. F. Watts, and actress Ellen Terry, was written for a private Bloomsbury theatrical party in 1931. It is being presented in conjunction with the Grolier Club’s exhibition, This Perpetual Fight: Love and Loss in Virginia Woolf’s Intimate Circle (17 September–22 November 2008).

This staged reading is sponsored by the William Morris Society in the United States, the Grolier Club, American Friends of Arts and Crafts in Chipping Campden, the Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms, and the Victorian Society in America.

Arthur Giron, the director, is a playwright and former head of the Graduate Playwriting Program at Carnegie Mellon University. A founding member of Ensemble Studio Theatre, the nation’s foremost play development organization, Giron had been called “One of our best contemporary dramatists” by critic Rosette La Mont. His latest play Emilie’s Voltaire won the Galileo Prize and will open in New York in 2009. The cast includes Liza Vann as Julia Margaret Cameron. A recipient of the Clarence Ross Fellowship from the American Theatre Wing, she has performed extensively in regional theatre. Her latest work is Good Ol’ Girls, which airs on PBS later this year.

Tickets: $12 reduced rate for members of the Stickley Museum and other sponsoring organizations, $18 for all others, may be purchased from the William Morris Society in the United States, either online at www.morrissociety.org.

Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. A reception will follow the performance.

For more information: (302) 831-3250.

Location: The Grolier Club is at 47 East 60th St., New York, www.grolierclub.org.

More information on this performance can be found on The William Morris Society’s blog.

Virginia Woolf's Freshwater is a post from The Stickley Museum At Craftsman Farms

Don’t forget about our upcoming Fall Harvest Family Day! The day will include square dancing, hayrides, pumpkin painting, butter churning, apple cider pressing, rug hooking demonstrations, quilt making demonstrations, potato printing, simple crafts for younger kids, 1910 carnival-style games like clothes pin in the milk bottle, and a general store featuring old fashioned candy, cider, doughnuts, and a mum sale.

The Fall Harvest Family Day is partially funded by a generous grant from the Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation.

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Parsippany Focus has a great piece on our upcoming Fall Harvest Family Day!

The Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms invites visitors of all ages to greet autumn’s arrival at its annual Family Day, on Saturday, September 20, from 12:00 Noon to 4:00 p.m. on the grounds of Craftsman Farms. A National Historic Landmark nestled on 30 pristine acres of woodlands, Craftsman Farms is the former home of visionary designer, Gustav Stickley and his family. Adults and children will delight in glimpses of early 20th century farm life. The special afternoon will feature a performance by the Ironia Reelers Square Dancers from Randolph, New Jersey, and include apple cider pressing, butter churning, and old-fashioned hayrides around The Farms. Families will also enjoy craft activities like pumpkin painting and old-fashioned, carnival–style games.

Via Parsippany Focus – All Local, All Parsippany

The Fall Harvest Family Day is partially funded by a generous grant from the Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation.

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Mark E. Weaver will be speaking on Mount Desert Island Maine: The Arts & Crafts Influence.” at our members’ reception on Saturday, September 13.

Trombonist Mark E. Weaver is the youngest son of listed American artist Robert Edward Weaver. Born in Peru, Indiana, Weaver received his formal musical education at the Indiana University School of Music as a recipient of the Cole Porter Music scholarship, graduating with a bachelor of music degree in trombone performance in 1979. Weaver is also an alumnus of the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, CA, and the Stetson Summer Orchestral Music Institute in Deland, FL.

Weaver is the principal trombonist of The United States Coast Guard Band, and has toured extensively with band across the United States, and has performed in Russia, and the United Kingdom. In addition, Weaver is second trombonist of the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra, and has performed with the New York Pops, Boston Festival Orchestra, Springfield (Massachusetts) Symphony, Bridgeport Symphony, The Connecticut Virtuosi, and Salt Marsh Opera Company. Over his career, Weaver has performed with such esteemed conductors as Leonard Berstein, Zubin Mehta, Leonard Slatkin, and Lawrence Leighton Smith.  Weaver has performed on National Public Radio, NBC’s Today Show, and the Cable News Network (CNN)and at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. He is a former adjunct professor of trombone at the University of Rhode Island.

When not performing music, Weaver continues to nurture his interest in art, antiques, and architecture. His special interest in the American Arts and Crafts Movement began in 1995 when he bought his first piece of L & JG Stickley furniture. Since then, Weaver has become an avid student of the movement, concentrating on the work of the metalsmiths of the Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston. In recent years he has contributed several articles to Style 1900 magazine and was a small discussion group leader with colleague Rosalie Berberian on the subject of Arts and Crafts silver at the 2008 Grove Park Inn Arts and Crafts Conference in Asheville, NC. Weaver’s most recent article for Style1900 appears in the August 2008 issue. Weaver is a regular attendee of the Salve Regina University Conference for Historic Preservation in Newport, Rhode Island, and is a member of the Preservation Society of Newport County, Florence Griswold Museum, and serves as a trustee of the Craftsman Farms Foundation.

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Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms is participating in Smithsonian Magazine‘s Museum Day on September 27, 2008. Museum Day is a chance for you (and a friend!) to get free admission to participating museums. Smithsonian has this to say about the Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms:

Designed, built, and lived in by early 20th Century designer Gustav Stickley, it is one of the most significant structures of the American Arts and Crafts Movement. The site, which consists of 30 acres and nine historic buildings has been designated a National Historic Landmark.
Exhibits

Stickley’s home, a massive log structure of his own design, has been restored and interpreted for tours. An original Stickley cottage is also on view and scenic walking trails are open. Shop containing extensive collection of reference books, as well as pottery, tiles, and more.

To get your Museum Day pass, look in the September 2008 issue of Smithsonian magazine or get your card online.

Via The Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms | Museum Day Venues | Smithsonian Magazine

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