Volunteers, representing many facets of the travel, tourism and hospitality industries demonstrated their commitment to giving back by assisting the National Park Service in sprucing up the areas around 12 locations on the National Mall, including the World War II Memorial, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial and the Vietnam Memorial.  The occasion was the 1st Tourism Cares Volunteer Day that was held on September 10 in Washington, DC.  Joining the travel professionals were students studying hospitality and tourism at The George Washington University, George Mason, Howard and the Northern Virginia Community College. 

The group's efforts upgraded the overall appearance of the park benches and walkways while demonstrating their commitment to Tourism Cares' mission to preserve the travel experience for future generations.  Volunteers saved the Park Service more than $26,000 in labor costs and 7 weeks of work during a time when budgets are very tight.

To further pay tribute to the day, Tourism Cares awarded a $20,000 grant to the National 9/11 Memorial & Museum now under construction at Ground Zero in New York City. The grant is part of a $161,000 pledge to fund a case that will be used to display the last remaining large scale model of the World Trade Center. The model will serve as a centerpiece at the museum.

Get ready to get your hands dirty and earn your sea legs! Tourism Cares is returning to the age of sail and will gather volunteers at Mystic Seaport in Mystic, Connecticut on Friday, May 6, 2011 for its annual give back program.

Located along the banks of the historic Mystic River, Mystic Seaport is the nation's leading maritime museum, attracting 300,000 visitors annually. Established in 1929, the museum campus entails more than 100 buildings spread across 50 acres.

 Maintaining such a large and diverse campus is a challenge for the museum staff that has been forced to make personnel cuts during these recessionary times.  Tourism Cares volunteers will lend a hand and help Mystic Seaport complete projects that might normally find themselves on the deferred maintenance list. Among other things, volunteer projects for the day will include roofing, painting, landscaping, ship maintenance and more. 

Registration will be open soon - check your inboxes for updates! Click here to learn more about Mystic Seaport.

Tourism Cares will help convention delegates give back this fall at both the NTA and USTOA conferences.

Tourism Cares and NTA Give Back

One of Montreal's most visited tourist attractions, Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount-Royal will be the venue for this year's NTA and Tourism Cares Give Back event. In the spirit of the holidays, NTA members will decorate several rooms at the oratory to  prepare them for the busy holiday travel season. Additionally, mem bers will help with a  gift-giving program for ill and underprivileged children in the area.

Tourism Cares and USTOA Give Back sponsored by Trip Mate

Taking Ownership

 One of the real takeaways of volunteering at a Tourism Cares volunteer event is that you always walk away taking ownership of the place where you worked hard all day to preserve, conserve or restore. You feel that you've m ade a difference in a place and you hold it in your heart forever. It's happened for thousands of Tourism Cares volunteers in places like New Orleans, Mt. Vernon, Ellis Island and Gettysburg. Sometimes you can't wait to go back to see how it has blossomed since your visit.

One of those places is the Mississippi Gulf Coast where, after only a few months since Hurricane Katrina's devastating visit, 300 Tourism Cares volunteers spent 2 days sleeping in tents and military barracks, sifted through rubble looking for what might remain of artifacts lost from several museums along the coast. One such place was the much anticipated Frank Gehry designed Ohr-O'Keefe Museum, scheduled to open in 11 months.

Built on the Biloxi shoreline, it was designed to be "hurricane proof".  It may have been, but, it wasn't "barge proof" because Katrina picked up the mammoth Grand Casino barge and tossed it  across Highway 90, literally crushing the construction site.  Tourism Cares volunteers lifted heavy girders and sheet metal to clear the area.

But, it's the ending to this story that's the amazing part.  The people of Mississippi, their homes and possessions gone and their beautiful landscape destroyed, never lost faith and resolved that the Ohr-O'Keefe Museum of Art would not be lost forever. 

And it wouldn't be.  The first of several buildings that will make up the new Ohr-O'Keefe Museum will open to the public on November 6, 2010.  If you saw it as we did that day, you'd say it could never be done. But, if you talked with the people of Biloxi, even back in those darkest days, you got the feeling it would.  Tourism Cares is privileged to have been even a small part of the story.

The mission of the Backstreet Cultural Museum is to preserve the unique cultural traditions of the African-American society in New Orleans. Housed in a Creole cottage in the heart of the Tremé neighborhood, it is the only museum dedicated to these rich folk-life and musical traditions. The Tremé, located directly adjacent to the French Quarter, has been, and continues to be, a vibrant enclave of musicians and artists in New Orleans. The museum educates visitors about this vital cultural heritage through exhibits and presentations of the art and music surrounding the celebration of these traditions.

The Backstreet Cultural Museum was chosen for this special grant in the amount of $2,500 by enlisting its supporters to vote in an on-line poll as part of the 2010 Tourism Cares Save Our Sites grant selection. Four sites competed in the six-week on-line competition including The Apollo Theater Walk of Fame, New York, NY; Delta Blues Museum, Clarksdale, MS; and Virginia's Heritage Music Trail, Crooked Road Wayside Kiosk, Wise, VA.

Survey Says...

Tourism Cares' Save Our Sites program is gaining popularity and we've discovered one of the many reasons why - people like it!

We asked a marketing class at Missouri State University to do a project to survey 600 travelers on their opinions about preserving sites for future generations and the importance of donating to that cause. Not only do they feel it's important, they feel compelled to give and will do so more generously if they know their donation is matched by the company they're doing business with.