FORT SMITH, Ark. — The United States Marshals Museum recently received a half a million-dollar donation to go towards its $14 million capital campaign goal.
The donor, who remains anonymous, has given the museum a year to match the donation.
“We are so cognoscente of our nonprofit brothers and sisters as we move through this pandemic and as we move through covid-19, so to be able to say we received a $500,000 donation, which is a matching donation is pretty powerful stuff,” said Alice Alt, President of the U.S. Marshals Museum Foundation.
Alt says this anonymous donation speaks to the greatness the museum is and the belief in the project. She sees this donation as a win not just for the museum, but for other nonprofits.
“It’s an exciting time for us for sure as we move fast and furious to finish our $14 million capital campaign with our sights laser focused on that $8 million so that we can go ahead, and push go on the experience production and open our doors to the public,” she said.
David Kennedy is the curator of collections and exhibits, a few weeks ago he started doing Facebook lives to connect with friends of the museum locally and across the country.
“The pieces we have that I’ve been showing that are in some cases key pieces of our collection that we will be using to be telling the story of the Marshals service,” he said.
He says some of the items might surprise people, like an honorary U.S. Marshals badge, that here have been fewer than 10 ever issued. Also a roll of toilet paper that someone mailed to a federal judge in Kentucky to protest in the 80s.
“We’re also offering a little bit of a tease of not just what we are going to be for the people living in our area who easily want to come and see the museum, but for the people who are four, five, six states away who may decide at some point that they are going to put Fort Smith as a destination,” Kennedy said.
The museum is a little over $13.5 million from its capital campaign goal. The museum says they are still on track to open late 2020 or early 2021, but because of the pandemic, they are looking to pushing their opening date a little further.