Canterbury Shaker Village Receives $2,500,000 Grant from Lilly Endowment Inc

Canterbury Shaker Village by Joe Klementovich
Canterbury Shaker Village by Joe Klementovich

Canterbury Shaker Village has received a $2,500,000 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its Religion and Cultural Institutions Initiative. The grant will support the Village’s reinvigoration of its on-site and online interpretive experiences to emphasize the history and culture of the Shaker faith at the core of its visitor engagement strategy.

“This opportunity to share much more of the Village’s unparalleled collections is both welcome and exciting,” stated Curator of Research and Collections Shirley Wajda. “With this grant, the Village will increase both access to and knowledge of the Canterbury Shakers, their religion, and their individual and collective lives.”

Over the next five years, Canterbury Shaker Village will create a “digital Village,” developing an online database of biographies, documents, artifacts, and interactive exhibitions. This accessible database will complement and extend new interactive and immersive on-site exhibitions focusing on the Shakers’ religious beliefs and experiences. “We will reinvigorate visitors’ experiences and understanding of the Shakers and Shakerism within American and world religious history,” added Wajda.

In addition, the Village will design and institute a new staff and guide training program based on the Village’s rich historical resources. “By creating a new framework for interpretation and the training to support it, the Village will have a chance to explore the Canterbury Shakers in exciting and engaging ways,” explained Director of Interpretation and Education Kyle Sandler. “This will place their religious beliefs at the core of the visitor experience here.”

Executive Director Erin Hammerstedt said the Shakers are among the most important religious experiments in United States history. “The Shakers’ revolutionary religious ideas shocked and intrigued their contemporaries,” she noted. “They challenged—and continue to challenge—Americans’ thinking about equality, sociality, and religious freedom. We thank Lilly Endowment for their generous support.”

Canterbury Shaker Village is one of 33 organizations across the United States receiving grants through the latest round of the Religion and Cultural Institutions Initiative. The initiative aims to support museums and other cultural organizations as they strengthen their capacity to provide fair, accurate, and balanced portrayals of the role religion has played and continues to play in the United States and around the world.

“The United States is widely considered to be one of the most religiously diverse nations today,” said Christopher L. Coble, Lilly Endowment’s vice president for religion. “Many individuals and families trust museums and other cultural institutions and visit them to learn about their communities and the world. We are excited to support these organizations as they embark on projects to help visitors understand and appreciate the diverse religious beliefs, practices and perspectives of their neighbors and others in communities around the globe.”

About Lilly Endowment Inc 

Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly, Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. Although the gifts of stock remain a financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion. Although the Endowment maintains a special commitment to its founders’ hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana, it also funds programs throughout the United States, especially in the field of religion. While the primary aim of its religion grantmaking focuses on strengthening the leadership and vitality of Christian congregations in the United States, the Endowment also seeks to foster public understanding about religion and lift up in fair, accurate and balanced ways the contributions that people of all faiths and diverse religious communities make to our greater civic well-being.

About Canterbury Shaker Village

Canterbury Shaker Village is a nonprofit-owned National Historic Landmark district featuring 25 restored Shaker buildings in their historic setting of 694 acres of forests, fields, gardens, and mill ponds. In addition to museum tours, exhibits, and programs, the preserved Shaker village provides a beautiful, relaxing, and inspiring environment for recreation, learning, reflection, and renewal of the human spirit.

Canterbury Shaker Village is a member of the NH Heritage Museum Trail, which connects the public with culturally rich heritage institutions in New Hampshire. For more information about The Trail, visit nhmuseumtrail.org.