Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/99748
EXTENDING THE MISSION INTO A NEW CENTURY 1 99 3 –20 1 2 Society President Ronald Sarasin (center) accepted the National Humanities Medal awarded to the Society in 2004 by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The presentation took place at the White House with President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush. 40 THE CAPITOL DOME audiences, to refine its core message, and to make America's national legislative heritage relevant to an ever more diverse public on the eve of the twentyfirst century. Changes included a new emphasis on educational programs with a national scope, an aggressive foundation and corporate membership campaign, and an expanded merchandising program. Ronald A. Sarasin succeeded Brown as president on January 3, 2000. A former Member of Congress from Connecticut (1973-79), Sarasin was a successful association president following his congressional career. He brought a talent for organizational management as well as Society President Clarence J. Brown (left) accepts a donation from G. Kent Bankas, Corporate Vice President for Government Relations at General Dynamics Corporation, in 1997 for the Where Freedom Speaks program. As president from 1992 to 2000, Brown expanded the organization's outreach for grant funding and program sponsorship. WHITE HOUSE PHOTOGRAPH C J. "BUD" BROWn, a former Member of Congress from Ohio (1965–82), served as president of the U.S. Capitol Historical Society from September 1992 until his retirement on January 1, 2000. His tenure was marked by a renewed emphasis on the national focus of the Society's educational outreach and a redefinition of its fiscal model. From the 1960s through the 1980s, brisk sales of Society publications and products to tourists at the Capitol and congressional purchases of the annual calendar had provided a dependable revenue base for the Society's operations. A downturn in tourism in the 1990s, however, reduced sales at the Capitol. New concerns about the calendar purchases as a congressional perk led the Society to market the calendar to congressional offices on a door-to-door basis rather than to rely upon the continuation of the bulk purchase of calendars through an annual legislative appropriation. Taken together, these changes caused a need for the organization to diversify its funding base. Under Brown's guidance in the 1990s, the Society began to re-identify its many LARENCE