The Vietnam Center will receive a $154,000 grant in July 2004 from the Houston Endowment. The grant will help make millions of pages of material available to researchers world-wide. The collections are currently held on microfilm at the Vietnam Archive and include rare 19th Century newspapers from French Indochina, documents of the United States Government, records of the United States Military Branches, and much more. The grant will be used to purchase a high-speed digital microfilm scanner, which will allow the center to put the microfilm on the internet.
Jesse and Mary Gibbs Jones, established the Houston Endowment in 1937. During 1938, Houston Endowment’s first full year of operation, the foundation donated $14,687, of which $11,285 went to schools and colleges. Over the years, Houston Endowment’s assets have grown to approximately $1.3 billion, enabling the foundation to donate more than $70 million annually to help fulfill the Jones’ vision of a healthy, vibrant community. The Houston Endowment also provided the Texas Tech Vietnam Center with the first Lee Roy Herron Scholarship in 2002, an award presented in honor of a U.S. Marine killed in Vietnam in 1969.