Connecticut Explored in Action: Friends and Endow Hartford 21 campaigns

Arts and Ideas Neighborhood Festival May 2024

Connecticut Explored intern Liz Harris and publisher Kathy Hermes staff the CTE table at the Arts and Ideas Neighborhood Festival, The Hill, New Haven, May 18, 2024. photo: CTE

A team of senior computer science majors at Central Connecticut State University won the annual Computer Science Industrial Advisory Board Senior Project Award for their project, an app for Connecticut Explored that will create walking tours with text and pictures from our magazine. Pictured (left to right) are Prof. Stan Kurkovsky, Marek Grabowski, CS Industrial Advisory Board Chair Tim Davoll, Patrick Lynch, Olga Veselova, Vincenzo D’Aria, and Minh Tram. photo: Kathy Hermes

Hartford Public Library’s Hartford History Center research specialist handed out issues of Connecticut Explored to attendees at HPL’s Summer Learning Kickoff on June 1, 2024. The Summer Learning Kickoff also included a parade to celebrate the library’s 250th anniversary since its inception as a private subscription company. photo: Hartford Public Library

Publisher Emeritus Elizabeth Normen speaks at the New Haven Museum on February 1, 2024, about the origins of the book African American Connecticut Explored, published by Wesleyan University Press in 2014. photo: Kathy Hermes

Support Our Annual Friends Campaign

The Friends of Connecticut Explored have kept us going for 22 years, sustaining not just our quarterly magazine but also our free, twice-monthly Grating the Nutmeg podcasts and our educational children’s books and supplemental materials. And, by supporting Connecticut Explored, you have helped us promote the museums, historical societies, historic cemeteries, and libraries that make up our organizational partners—places vital to making Connecticut a wonderful place to live!

We hope you will renew your Friends support in 2024. All gifts are appreciated and will help us continue bringing you one good

Intern Lu Cacace at Connecticut History Day at CCSU

story after another. Our Winter 2024–2025 issue will feature stories about food and drink, past and present; Spring 2025 will examine the power of words; Summer 2025 will visit the history of celebrations; and Fall 2025 will explore our environmental histories. We also have big plans for a special issue in 2026 commemorating the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding!

Connecticut Explored has benefited from a generous two-year partnership grant with Connecticut Humanities that will end on October 31, 2024. That grant helped us reorganize after the retirements of our founding publisher, Elizabeth Normen, and our assistant publisher, Mary Donohue. We faced rising publication costs due to inflation but were able to keep our prices stable and provide the same free access to our online back issues and podcasts. Now, however, we must raise our prices to meet these increased expenses.

New Subscription Rates, Starting September 1, 2025

$38.00 for a regular 1-year subscription, $64.00 for 2 years

$32.00 for seniors (60+) and members of our organizational partners, $54.00 for 2 years

$25.00 for teachers and students, $43.00 for 2 years

$22.50 for our digital-only pdf-reader subscription (1-year only)

$10.00 for a single issue

All subscriptions will continue to provide free access to digitized and online back issues.

For those who contribute to the Friends campaign and renew their subscriptions, we will honor our 2024 prices, even if your current subscription extends into 2025 or beyond. We will add issues to your current subscription at the 2024 prices for 1-year, 2-year, and gift subscriptions.

To take advantage of our 2024 subscription rates, donate online. Then visit ctexplored.org/subscribe and apply promo code FRIENDS24. Or send a check to Friends of Connecticut Explored, Department of History, Central Connecticut State University, 1615 Stanley Street, New Britain, CT 06050, and on the memo line, indicate your donation amount and the subscription you want. Your donation is tax-deductible.

Endow Hartford 21

Thanks to your generosity in 2022 and 2023, Connecticut Explored was one of only seven organizations selected to participate in the Endow Hartford 21 campaign this year—

Editor and Education Specialist Kristen Levithan at the Connecticut League of Museums Annual Conference, June 3, 2024. photo: Kathy Hermes

and with a 100% percent match for all donations between $250 and $10,000. You still have time to double the impact of your gift until the campaign ends on December 31, 2024. This endowment ensures our ability to continue to publish your favorite magazine well into the future!

For gifts to the Connecticut Explored Endow Hartford 21 Fund, please make your check payable to the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving (or HFPG), and on the memo line, write “Endow Hartford 21 Connecticut Explored.”

Members of the CTE staff—(left to right) Olivia Grella, Kristen Levithan, Arianna Basche, Patrick O’Sullivan, Mary Donohue, and Kathy Hermes—got creative at the Claypen in West Hartford. photo: CTE

Mail the check to the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving, Attn: Deborah Rothstein,

10 Columbus Boulevard, 8th floor, Hartford, CT 06106.

You can also donate online at bit.ly/endow-ctexplored.

Thank you for your support!