Granting An Early Gift

The Archaeology Channel receives Cares Act grant and schedules video platform

A special holiday gift came early — and in the nick of time — to the Archaeological Legacy Institute (ALI).

On Oct. 29, the Eugene nonprofit ALI received a grant of $24,630 from Lane Arts Council, funds that are part of the Coronavirus Relief Fund (CRF) and allocated to states by the federal government under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act.ALI, like other cultural and arts nonprofits, has faced serious financial challenges in 2020 as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The new funding will allow ALI to launch in January a new subscription video-on-demand service, a Netflix-like platform called Heritage Broadcasting Service, which will be available online as well as via Roku. Through this online service, ALI will make accessible to the public a vast array of video programming on cultural heritage topics of all descriptions, including archaeology, ancient cultures and sites, history, indigenous peoples, cultural traditions, the search for origins, human evolution, explorations of ancient mysteries and much, according to Rick Pettigrew, ALI’s executive director.

“We feel very lucky, as a small nonprofit during a time of worldwide crisis, to have this chance to launch a video subscription streaming service that both fulfills our nonprofit mission and presents the prospect of an unlimited funding source for future development and public service,” Pettigrew says. “Although this has been a challenging year for us financially, we are uniquely positioned to move forward aggressively in the video streaming space, as we have more than 20 years of video streaming experience and a huge international network of producers eager to find new ways to support their film and video projects.”

Archaeological Legacy Institute is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in Eugene and organized to share the human cultural heritage widely through the use of cutting-edge technology. ALI’s principal project is The Archaeology Channel, a streaming-media website featuring video and audio programs on archaeology, indigenous peoples and cultural heritage and reaching an audience of 250,000 visitors monthly.