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Greetings all!

As some of you are aware, I am working with a group of like minded individuals to start a museum chronicling Michigan ’s role in 20th century warfare.

This is something that we have been debating and planning for some time, and after watching the way the rest of the country berated the auto companies during recent congressional hearings, we decided it was high time someone created a place dedicated to telling the tale of how Michigan ’s industry helped keep this nation safe.

As of December 19th, we are a Michigan registered non-profit, we have our EIN number and we have opened a bank account, I spent most of Christmas filling out the IRS Form 1023 and have it pretty much ready to mail in to get our 501 status, our friends at the IRS raised the filing fee from $500 to $750, so I need to raise a few more dollars before it gets mailed in.

I therefore ask you to visit our website and look around mimths.org/ please let me know what you think of the site so far.

We are dedicated to this cause and have not entered into this venture lightly, and we want to do this right, building a museum to honor our forefathers and foremothers stories, and preserve the story of Michigan as the “Arsenal of Democracy” for future generations.
We hope to fulfill our dreams of establishing a museum and at the same time create jobs and economic stimulus by creating a new educational tourist destination in our area.

As a forming group in these troubled times, we would greatly appreciate any support, advice or kind words you may have for us.

Thanks for your time

Chris Causley

Thanks to a generous donation from one of our founding members, we were able to pay the $750.00 filing fee and send in our tax deductible paperwork to the IRS. With luck we will be approved and have our 501(C)3 status approved in a few months!

Keep an eye on the new "projects" page too, we have some neat "stuff" coming!!

Good luck! I'm sure we'll all follow progress with interest.

Thanks Trevor,
We need all the luck we can muster.

Once we get established we hope to work with the Army loans folks and hopefully get our hands on an example of Detroit built armor to restore and display.

We have just made a deal with another local museum to get a Hudson Invader engine, they were used in the LCVP's, rescue launches and some PT boats. They were made here at a plant not far from my house.
The engine has been sitting in outdoor storage and needs lots of TLC, I hope to have it in shop this weekend and up on our "projects" page next week sometime.

We need some members and donations to help us get off the ground, so tell your friends and even your enemies if you think they might join up.

Chris

Chris,
Just curious, but does the Michigan National Guard have a state military history museum? I would think in Lansing or Camp Grayling? Most national guards have something...

Neil

Neil,

I am only aware of the Museum on Selfridge ANGB, there are a number of smaller private museums and groups like mine around the state, I am talking with some of the other "building less" groups in the area in hopes I can convince them to unite under a common flag.

One major problem as I see it is that most groups like this are formed by guys like me, tread heads and rivet counters... but to make a museum that will last, we have to tell a story that has a broader, educational appeal, embracing the technical and the socio-economic aspects of the story. I had the benefit of sitting in on a museum development project with high power museum consultants and it taught me a lot, sadly the organization I was part of at the time chose not to heed the advice of the professionals they had hired.... This new organization is formed around a core group that paid attention.
It will be a challenge, but we believe that the story is worth telling and deserves to be done right.

We cannot do it alone, we need your support!

UPDATE

We are now officially an IRS 501(c)3 organization!
Thank you!
www.mimths.org
Donate via PayPal and get an instant tax receipt!

It cost $750 to be a non-profit? Something's wrong with that

I think they did that to make sure folks are serious. It used to be cheaper and easier to get a tax exempt status, a lot of folks abused the system.

They also made the finacial accountability & reporting rules tougher.... a lot of this came in the wake of Katrina and all the scammers that popped up around that relief effort.