Fundraising Ideas for Historical Museums by Ruth Paget

Fundraising Ideas for Historical Museums by Ruth Paget 

I associate historical museums more with field trips than as money generating sites, but I think historical museums need to think about revenue generating activities when seeking donors or government support. 

Class field trips like the ones I took as an elementary school student to the Detroit Historical Society helped provide that organization with operating funds as well as teaching young students about the Chippewa Native Americans, French fur traders and Michigan trading posts, and the impact of the Ford Model T on American society. 

The high cost of insuring field trips has made them almost a relic of the past in public schools in cash-strapped districts. This situation has probably forced historical societies to seek donors to ensure operating funds. I love historical museums and think there are several ways they could increase revenue. 

The first way is to seek out parents who will take their own children on field trips. Reaching parents is not as easy as contacting a school board, but historical museums might think of advertising the benefits of a visit to their site to the following markets, especially if they have newsletters: 

-religious organizations 

-sport teams 

-language organizations 

-charter schools 

-K12 school groups 

-music schools 

-dance schools 

-drama groups 

When I lived in Wisconsin in the 1990s, field trips had become a parent’s responsibility. I took my daughter Florence to the Wisconsin Historical Museum on Capitol Square in Madison to see exhibits about the Ho-Chunk Nation Native Americans, the lumber and paper industries, and German and Norwegian settlers, who lived in log cabins. This is another historical museum that is important for understanding the sociological and cultural history of the state. 

Historical museums have events that other historical museums might replicate. The Pickett’s Mill Battlefield, a Georgia State Park, holds re-enactments of the Civil War Battle fought there with African-American and white troops on the Union side. This event engages volunteers and the community. Even a nominal fee to attend this re-re-enactment could raise operating funds. 

Many historical museums offer hikes around their site or long walks in the museum. Museum visitors might welcome the chance to buy items such as the following to help support the museum:  

-cold water 

-cold soda 

-cheddar cheese fish chips 

-shrimp chips 

-tortilla chips 

-potato chips 

-brownies 

-guava cookies 

-cold brew coffee 

A combination of donors, sales, and parent doing their own field trips might increase historical museum revenue to keep these community resources open and increase funds for temporary exhibits and historical documentaries shown at the site. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Fun Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Fun Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

I like sneakily indulging in chain food restaurant food each time my husband Laurent and I visit Dobbins Air Force Base in Marietta, Georgia north of Atlanta. Some of my favorite places to dine include:  

-Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen  

I like the popcorn shrimp combo with buttermilk biscuit, a side, and a drink. My favorite sides are coleslaw with a thick dressing, spicy red beans and rice, spicy Cajun fries, and macaroni and cheese. Popeye’s serves seasonal fish. 

I got on their mailing list and learned about their flounder sandwiches. I had those twice and really liked them. They come with mild or spicy breading. The spicy breading was not too hot. 

People who say they do not like fast food might be surprised by Popeye’s with its great sides and not too greasy food. 

-Cracker Barrel 

I like Cracker Barrel, because you can order a Southern breakfast there all day long in addition to French toast and pancake combination meals. 

My favorite breakfast combo has two eggs over easy, a choice of meat (I like bacon, but you can also order things like spicy chicken sausage), loaded hash brown casserole with cheese, and buttermilk biscuits with gravy. (The gravy is a béchamel sauce made with flour, butter, and milk.) 

-Panda Express 

Panda Express serves food buffet style. My three favorite meals are: 

-broccoli beef 

-Mongolian beef (stir fried sliced green onions with beef and garlic) 

-refried rice 

-Kentucky Fried Chicken 

I eat KFC about once a month at home in California and this does not change when I travel.  

I like the 8-piece bucket meal with biscuits, coleslaw, and mashed potatoes and chicken gravy. 

-Dunkin’ Donuts 

I like to eat Dunkin’ Donuts for breakfast before airplane travel. This little susspeisen (“sugar meal” – pronounced “zusshpaisen” in German) fills me up all the way from Atlanta (Georgia) to Monterey (California) where I live. 

6 donuts plus 2 coffees cost about $15 in Marietta, Georgia. That is a great deal to end a trip. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Neapolitan Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Neapolitan Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

Atlanta, Georgia has many local food chains worth seeking out when visiting the city. It is easy to have local chains with all the suburbs around the city. 

Blue Moon Pizza off I-75 on Windy Hill Road north of Atlanta is a local chain that serves reliably delicious pizza and Greek salad. 

My husband Laurent and I both love Margherita Pizza with tomato, mozzarella slices, and basil. Blue Moon’s tomatoes on this pizza are pickled cherry tomatoes. The basil was cooked in the sauce for Covid times. The mozzarella was gooey melted blobs that had a sweet flavor. All of this is everything I like in Margherita Pizza. 

The large Greek salad was for me. I have made it a habit to order one before airplane trips as vitamin ordinance. Blue Moon’s Greek salad was just stellar, because it was full of pickled hot yellow peppers, tomatoes, pickled artichokes, red onion slices, feta cheese chunks, black salty olives, and torn romaine lettuce. This salad seems to help clear my sinuses. 

Blue Moon placed a large herb seasoned pita bread in the bottom of this salad almost like a Lebanese or Syrian fattoush salad. The bread at Blue Moon is fresh, and let me soak up every drop of oregano-rich oil and vinegar dressing. 

Southern Italy had ancient Greek settlement, which might explain why pizzerias often have Greek salads on their menu. (You can still see in Paestum south of Naples three ancient Greek Temples devoted to Poseidon, Hera, and Ceres.) 

The Blue Moon Pizzeria retains Italian culture if not ancient Greek in any case, and I am glad to see that they do catering. 

Blue Moon Pizza 

2359 Windy Hill Road SE 

#100 

Marietta, Georgia 30067 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Senegalese Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Senegalese Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

One of the reasons I love visiting Atlanta (Georgia) is all the international cuisine you can sample in and around the city. My husband Laurent is a French professor and often takes his students (and me) out for Senegalese lunches at the African Soul Food Restaurant in Marietta, Georgia. Senegal is a former French colony where French is still spoken. 

The dish I like to order as an introduction to Senegalese cuisine is Yassa Chicken (poulet au yassa). For this dish, pieces of chicken and slices of onion are marinated overnight in lemon juice, garlic, and mustard. The next day, the chicken is baked or grilled and the onions are caramelized. The African Soul Food Restaurant uses peppers that taste like very spicy pequin peppers in the onions. Everything is served over a large helping of white rice. Its flavor is kicky and fills you up with the rice. 

A thirst quenching African drink that goes with this meal is Bissap – a mixture of hibiscus flowers, sugar, water, and fresh ginger. 

This unpretentious meal is quite healthy. According to www.healthline.com , onions contain antioxidants and have been linked to a reduced risk of cancer, lower blood sugar levels, and improved bone health. Onions are relatively low-priced, which makes this a reasonably priced meal to make at home, too. 

The shopping center where the African Soul Food Restaurant is located is painted white with black arches to make it look like an African town. There is a Libyan market, an Arab market, a Caribbean restaurant, and a taqueria located here as well. You can easily do an international shopping trip with lunch in this shopping center. (There is plenty of parking, too!) 

African Soul Food 

585 Franklin Gateway SE 

Marietta, Georgia 30067 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Mexican Chorripollo in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Mexican Chorripollo in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

One restaurant that my husband Laurent and I go back to several times when we visit Atlanta is The Border, located north of the city in Smyrna, Georgia. 

One of my new favorite dishes there is Texas guacamole, which arrives in a Texas-sized, 8-inch across the top mortar with crushed avocado, chopped tomato, chopped peppers, chopped onions, and cilantro. I love guacamole, and it is a dream to have that much good guacamole to eat. 

One of the dishes I like to eat at The Border is chorripollo. “Chorri” refers to the spicy chorizo sausage in the dish. “Pollo” in Spanish means “chicken.” 

The Border serves this dish with flattened and grilled breast meat. They take off the sausage skins and cook the sausage. The sausage goes on top of the chicken breast along with melted cheese. 

Chorripollo comes with rice, black beans, and flour tortillas. I cut the chorripollo into strips and place these in the tortillas along with the rice and beans to make tacos. That is yummy. 

This salty dish along with a frozen margarita is very satisfying in Atlanta’s torpid summer heat with thunderclouds billowing upwards in the sky. 

Chorripollo is not as well known as other Mexican dishes, but if you would like to try it, The Border’s version of it is delicious. 

The Border Restaurant 

2569 Cobb Parkway SE 

Smyrna, Georgia 30080 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Seafood $ Hack in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Seafood $ Hack in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

Georgia’s incomparable, briny, and plump shrimp can be pricey on most Atlanta menus, but if you expand your dining horizons to Mexico, you can find delicious shrimp at reasonable prices. 

On visits to The Border Restaurant in Smyrna (Georgia), my husband Laurent eats Camarones al mojo de ajo (shrimp in garlic sauce). The shrimp is mild flavored and arrives with Spanish rice and tortillas to be made into tacos. 

Shrimp is very good for you, if you do not eat it in excess. (If you are allergic to seafood, obviously do not eat it.) 

According to www.medlineplus.gov and www.healthline.com - shrimp has the following nutrients that support vital functions in the body: 

-iron: helps with muscle formation and oxygen use 

-phosphorous: helps with bone and teeth formation and maintenance and repair of cells 

-potassium: helps with nerve function and muscle contraction 

-magnesium: helps with nerve and muscle function, supports the immune system, and helps form strong bones 

Shrimp does have high sodium levels, but when in the southern US in the summer, I actually welcome salt in the diet. 

The Border Restaurant has great frozen margaritas to go with this delicious shrimp dish as well. 

The Border Restaurant 

2569 Cobb Parkway 

Smyrna, Georgia 30080 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

Click for Ruth Paget's Books

Chinese Food in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Chinese Food in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

When my husband Laurent and I go to Atlanta (Georgia), we love searching out neighborhood Chinese restaurants for plump, briny shrimp dishes. 

One of the best meals we have eaten in Atlanta was at the The Peking Garden, which was built to look like a Chinese house with red doors in Smyrna, Georgia. 

The Peking Garden is unassuming outside, but has some nice artwork inside - a bubbling and spotlessly clean aquarium by the entryway is a 5-foot porcelain vase, a wall-size bas relief sculpture painting of diners at a garden tea pavilion, paintings of feather-rich birds turning their heads sitting on top of bushes with flowers, and curling dragon sculptures rippling across the walls. I like Chinese art, so the effect of all the art on me was to make me serene and happy. 

Many East Coast city people seek out high quality Chinese food. When we ate at Peking Garden, there were Latino families, Chinese families, African-American couples, policemen, and Laurent and me in the restaurant for a late Sunday lunch. I felt like a cross-section of Atlanta’s population was out for a delicious and pleasurable meal. 

The Chinese are experts at cooking seafood and do wonders with Georgia’s incomparable plump shrimp. We chose a simple dish that really lets the shrimp shine – kung pao shrimp. Laurent chose the mild sauce for his order, and I ordered a spicy sauce for mine. 

Kung pao shrimp’s main ingredients are shrimp, green peppers, onions, mushrooms, carrots, and peanuts. The sauce is what really makes this dish delicious. It is made with dark and light soy sauces, fresh ginger, Sichuan peppers (numbing yet delicious), vinegar, water, and a little sugar. 

Kung pao shrimp fills you up when you eat it with an order of white rice for each person. It also clears your sinuses, so brink some tissue with you. 

The kung pao shrimp was about $13 for each order. I think that price is very fair for the delicious and healthy meal we ate. 

Peking Garden Restaurant 

2526 S. Cobb Drive SE 

Smyrna, Georgia 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Mexican Food in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Mexican Food in Smyrna, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

One of my favorite reliable spots for Mexican food north of Atlanta, Georgia (off Cobb Parkway by Red Lobster) is The Border Mexican Restaurant. As a Californian, I eat Mexican food three times a month and Asian food once a month. When I travel, I seek out both of these foods. I would say that these foods in Atlanta are not as spicy as they are in California, but are still flavorful and healthy. 

One of The Border’s big treats is Texas Guacamole. This guacamole is a flavorful blend of tomato, onion, cilantro, and lots of avocado. Our guacamole arrived in a basalt mortar that was 8 inches across the top and full of guacamole. My husband Laurent and I spent half an hour eating this silky appetizer.

Frankly, I think the Texas guacamole alone is worth a visit to The Border Restaurant, but we did order meals to go with it. 

I tried one of my favorite Mexican restaurant dishes: enchiladas verdes. This dish is shredded chicken rolled up in soft wheat tortillas and covered in mild, green tomatillo tomato sauce. Black beans and Spanish rice come with this meal and tasted very Californian with the hot sauce I added to them. 

Laurent tried steak tacos with cilantro and onion. He added dollops of guacamole to them and thought that was a great combination. 

The Border Restaurant has delicious, unpretentious food. It is moderately priced as well, which you cannot beat in pricey Atlanta. 

The Border Restaurant 

2569 Cobb Parkway SE Smyrna, Georgia 30080 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Greek Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget

Greek Food in Marietta, Georgia by Ruth Paget 

When my husband Laurent and I visit Atlanta (Georgia), we always make at least one trip to Marietta Diner, located north of Atlanta by Kennesaw State University and Dobbins Air Force Base. Marietta Diner has an extensive all-American menu, which is popular with Atlanta Braves fans, military personnel, and students alike. 

However when I go to Marietta Diner, I study their menu and specials to look for Greek food, which hearkens back to my student days in Detroit and Chicago. 

I have been able to order delicious Greek meals like the following with the specials menu: 

For me – 

Greek pasta, which came with soup. The soup I ordered was naturally Greek, avgolemono, lemon-egg soup. Avgolemono soup is made with onions, rice, chicken stock, shredded chicken breast, eggs, and lemon juice. It is a sour cold fighter, which I like warm or room temperature. 

The Greek pasta was made with al dente penne pasta, melted feta cheese, sliced sun-dried tomatoes, small black olives, and bite-sized grilled chicken. The Greek pasta was salty and sour and perfect in Atlanta’s sweltering summer heat. 

For Laurent – 

A gyro (pronounced ‘yeer-o’) platter, which came with spanakopita (feta and spinach pie squares in buttered phyllo dough) and garlic fries. A gyro is shaved and roasted beef and pork served in pocket pita bread along with tomato, onion, and cucumber-yogurt (tzatziki) spread. The gyro disappeared. Laurent let Ruth, who likes vegetarian food, have the spanakopita. 

For dessert – 

A yummy baklava with rich lemon custard in the center of nutty layers of butter rich phyllo dough that were doused in honey. 

We ate this delicious meal for $44 and had leftovers to take home. We made 4 meals out of what we ordered, which averaged $11 each. I thought that was a pretty great price for Greek Isles food.

Marietta Diner 306 Cobb Parkway SE South 

Marietta, Georgia 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

Click for Ruth Paget's Books