Friends Bizarre Bazaar 2020

Friends of Nevada State Museum Las Vegas 501(c)(3)
START
20
November 2020
12:00 PM PST
END
22
November 2020
11:45 PM PST
RAISED
$1,642.00
GOAL $5,000.00
32.8% To Goal

About Our Auction

FINAL UPDATE: 1 p.m. on Monday 11/23: We finished at 33 percent of our goal after adding a donation that came in via the auction, apart from any bidding. (Okay, technically it was 32.8 percent before rounding up!)

Thank you to all participants, all bidders, all viewers, all donors! HAVE A SPECIAL HOLIDAY SEASON!

UPDATE #3 9:45 p.m. on Sunday 11/22: Friends are so gratified that supporters have cracked 30 percent of our fundraising goal. We now stand at precisely 30.4 percent, which translates to $1,518!

UPDATE # 2 late afternoon on Sunday 11/22: HAVING TROUBLE GETTING YOUR BID TO ENTER? Well, after you type in the $ figure, hover your cursor in the area right below. A gray button with white text will emerge, with the words, "Place my bid." Hit that, and be done! Good luck in your bidding!

UPDATE #1 mid-morning on Sunday 11/22: MINIMUM BIDS HAVE BEEN ADJUSTED - fancy talk for "lowered" - on all baskets that had zero bids thru Saturday. ("Buy now" prices were adjusted in many cases, too.) PLEASE ADJUST YOUR SHOPPING ACCORDINGLY, OK?!

Friends of Nevada State Museum Las Vegas - 501(c)(3) - are holding Bizarre Bazaar 2020, our first auction ever, online to suit current social-distancing requirements in Nevada.

We hope you enjoy holiday gift shopping while you also do good for the local community. The Nevada State Museum, Las Vegas is central to the preserving, interpreting and sharing of our Nevada heritage with locals, school children, visitors to Las Vegas, as well as researchers and scholars.

All auction proceeds go to Friends' projects and programs to enhance the museum.

Auction items come in a wide price range. Some items fit a bidder with a modest budget, but we also hope other patrons will bid extravagantly to show support for the Friends, and the museum the Friends hold dear.

To place a bid, you must create a 32Auctions account. You will use your credit card or your PayPal to pay for a successful high bid.

Auction items fall into five general categories:

1) Themed gift baskets that can serve as a solo gift, or can be unbundled to create more, smaller gifts. Many items are brand new, but gently used items, such as china or ceramic ware or costume jewelry, may also be present in a basket.

Every item auctioned as is. Any flaw is noted in the item's description.

Several gifts aren't suitable for baskets. In that case, the item's written description will note that it will be wrapped in cellophane or boxed, instead.

2) Sponsorship to purchase a taxidermy specimen of an animal species that lives in Nevada, but is currently unrepresented in NSMLV holdings. (Sponsor plaque will accompany specimen when on public display.)

3) Sponsorship to digitally preserve fragile old film of live entertainment in old, bygone LV casinos. (Sponsor name will appear onscreen and in film's title.)

4) Sponsorship to digitally preserve old vinyl records of community concerts held by school groups or churches. (Sponsors will be acknowledged by name in the museum archives. Funds raised by these winning bids will be combined to purchase specialized equipment to convert vinyl sound into digital audio files.)

5) Customized, personalized tours led by a curator or museum staffer for a small group (up to 4 people). Tours are available for: NSMLV's public galleries (Tour 1 with animal focus and Tour 2 with human focus) and Tour 3 of the Lost City Museum in Overton, both outdoors and indoors.


About Friends of Nevada State Museum Las Vegas 501(c)(3)

THE FRIENDS began as a non-profit Nevada LLC in 2016.

OUR MISSION IS THREE-FOLD: We support the Nevada State Museum, Las Vegas through fundraising. We promote, and advocate for, the museum through our outreach events and various social media. And we provide volunteers both for Friends events and museum events.

OUR PROJECTS HAVE INCLUDED: designing/running/evaluating a pilot program to provide free 1-year museum memberships to families with a fourth-grader in a Title 1 elementary school in ZIP codes surrounding the museum; funding bus transportation for field trips by to the museum for fourth-grade classes; and funding round-trip delivery of "mini museum" kits to classrooms.

WE SUPPORT the museum's "TravelingTrunk" program which loans various "mini museums" of artifacts, specimens, maps, models, etc. on a given theme, along with activity instructions and curriculum-compliant lesson plans. The Friends pay for round-trip delivery of trunks to local classrooms. We have also designed/assembled new trunks on STEM themes as well as the Black history of Las Vegas.

Our recent COVER for COVID CAMPAIGN raised more than $5,000 to purchase basic supplies for the museum (energy efficient light bulbs, for example) as well as museum-quality taxidermy of Nevada species not represented in the museum collection.

WE HAVE WON GRANTS for various projects from organizations including Clark County's OAG program for federal Community Development Block Grant dollars; the Nevada Humanities; Desert Research's STEAM Network; the Kasner Family Foundation in Henderson; the Nevada Regents Service.

ON A REGULAR BASIS we organize and hold events for specific demographics, which are both educational and entertaining. Some events are intended to raise funds; others are free outreach events to draw the community to the museum. For families we've held a Fossil Factory and a Dino Discovery. For adults we hold an annual wine-tasting and an annual tea.

OUR POPULAR MONTHLY MEETINGS (which are free and open to the general public) feature a guest speaker on a topic of Nevada history, Nevada natural history or present pop culture.

Learn More