Publishing Historical Records in Documentary Editions.

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission seeks proposals to publish documentary editions of historical records. We especially welcome projects that focus on broad historical movements in U.S. history, such as law (including the social and cultural history of the law), politics, social reform, business, military, the arts, and other aspects of the national experience, including any aspect of African American, Asian American, Hispanic American, and Native American history. Projects may also center on the papers of major figures from American history.
The Commission is especially interested in projects to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. We encourage applications that use collections to examine the ideals behind the founding of the United States and the continual interpretation and debate over those ideals over the past 250 years. We welcome projects that engage the public, expand civic education, and promote understanding of the nation’s history, democracy, and culture from the founding era to the present day.
The goal of this program is to provide access to, and editorial context for, the historical documents and records that tell the American story. Applicants should demonstrate familiarity with the best practices recommended by the Association for Documentary Editing (ADE) or the Modern Language Association (MLA) Committee on Scholarly Editions .
All new projects (those which have never received NHPRC funding) must have definitive plans for publishing and preserving a digital edition which provides online access to a searchable, fully-transcribed and annotated collection of documents. New projects may also prepare print editions (including ebooks and searchable PDFs posted online) as part of their overall publishing plan, but the contents of those volumes must be published in a fully-searchable digital edition within a reasonable period of time following print publication. The NHPRC encourages projects to provide free public access to online editions. Projects that do not have suitable plans for digital dissemination and preservation in place at the time of application will not be considered.
Grants are awarded to collaborative teams (including at least two scholar-editors, in addition to one or more archivists, digital scholars, data curators, and/or other support and technical staff, as necessary) for collecting, describing, preserving, compiling, transcribing, annotating, editing, encoding, and publishing documentary source materials online and in print. Eligible documentary edition projects typically focus on original manuscript or typewritten documents, but may also include other formats, such as analog audio and/or born-digital records. Because of the focus on historical documentary sources, grants do not support preparation of critical editions of published works unless such works are just a small portion of the larger project.
This grant program does not support the production of film or video documentaries. For a comprehensive list of the Commission's limitations on funding, please see What We Do and Do Not Fund. Applications that consist entirely of ineligible activities will not be considered.
Ongoing projects: Applicants from ongoing projects must demonstrate that they have successfully achieved the performance objectives associated with previous NHPRC awards; provide updated, current information, including a description of the new activities; describe the content and historical significance of the specific materials to be edited during the proposed grant period; show progress towards completing the edition; and justify costs in a new budget.
The successful application will demonstrate the historical value of the records to be included in the edition for its intended audiences, will outline a project that addresses best practices for the work and that is appropriately staffed, will propose a budget that accomplishes the project in a cost-effective manner, and will outline activities that bring researchers to the published edition.
For a comprehensive list of Commission limitations on funding, please see: "What we do and do not fund" (http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/apply/eligibility.html).
Award Information
A grant is for one year and for up to $175,000 per year. The Commission expects to make up to 25 grants in this category for a total of up to $3,000,000. Grants begin no earlier than January 1, 2022.
The Commission requires that grant recipients acknowledge NHPRC grant assistance in all publications, publicity, and other products that result from its support.
Eligibility
? U.S. nonprofit organizations or institutions
? U.S. colleges, universities, and other academic institutions
? State or local government agencies
? Federally-acknowledged or state-recognized Native American tribes or groups
In order to ensure eligibility, applicants should first review the rules and regulations governing NHPRC grants under the Administering an NHPRC Grant section.
Cost Sharing
The total costs of a project are shared between the NHPRC and the applicant organization.
Cost sharing is required. The applicant's financial contribution may include both direct and indirect expenses, in-kind contributions, non-Federal third-party contributions, and any income earned directly by the project. NHPRC grant recipients are not permitted to use grant funds for indirect costs (as indicated in 2 CFR 2600.101). Indirect costs must be listed under the applicant's cost sharing contribution if they are included in the budget.
The Commission provides no more than 50 per cent of total project costs in the Publishing Historical Records in Documentary Editions category. For example, a request of $75,000 in NHPRC grant funds means the applicant institution must provide at least $75,000 in cost share.
Other Requirements
Applicant organizations must be registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) prior to submitting an application, maintain SAM registration throughout the application and award process, and include a valid DUNS number in their application. Details on SAM registration and requesting a DUNS number can be found at the System for Award Management website at https://sam.gov. Please refer to the User Guides section and the Grants Registrations PDF.
Ineligible applications will not be reviewed.