| September 12, 2019 A year ago, we had hoped that the City of Venice might convert an old office building adjacent to the KMI Bridge into a new museum. That did not happen. And last spring, word got out that the San Marco Association board of directors was removing all of the KMI memorabilia from the grand hallway! I immediately went and met with the board president to determine what was going on. He informed me that all the items were being removed so they could repair cracks in the walls and then repaint the entire hallway (it needed it!). He added that they wanted to replace the KMI artifacts and make it an even greater display than existed before. He then asked if I would be willing to help them create a first class KMI exhibit. That said, I enlisted the support of Michelle Harm, the former curator of the Venice Museum & Archives, to see if she would help. Michelle created the KMI exhibit for us back in 2013 and was very excited about a permanent display of our stuff. During the past two months, she has inventoried all of the artifacts in the San Marco's possession and also has approached the museum to see if we can borrow, on loan, some of the items stored in their archives. Michelle also has had preliminary conversation with a company in Clearwater called Creative Arts that helps build displays for museums. Based on some input from them, we have come up with some ideas on building a museum-quality exhibit of KMI artifacts in the San Marco Building. I have attached a rough outline of our ideas. We estimate the cost for creating this exhibit will be between $30 and $40K. I have had conversation with Alex Hodgin about this project, and he graciously has agreed to allow us to fund this project through the KMI Legacy Fund, which he helped to create and many of you contributed to. I know you all are going to have a lot of questions for which I won't have immediate answers. I can't give you a timeline right now, for example, as there is much work to be done before the displays are installed. I can tell you that with Michelle's coordination, this project is in excellent hands. And while the San Marco today is not a museum in the literal sense, I think it's going to be an excellent venue for continuing to educate residents and visitors alike about the role that KMI played in the development of this city. As many of you know, I have been working behind the scenes for at least the last five years to get us to this point. I believe we are finally at the point of turning this vision into reality! I will endeavor to keep you updated as this project progresses. I plan to take lots of pictures which we can affix to the website. Larry, Larry R. Humes 240 Santa Maria St., #226 Venice, Florida 34285 407-595-1604 |
| PRELIMINARY KMI EXHIBIT PLANS Proposed by Michelle A. Harm July 16, 2019 |
 "San Marco" 2019 RENOVATION Photograph by Jim Flora,'62
Resealed the floor tiles and polished. Taken down all of our memobilia with plans to install museum quality displays. |
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 Restoring the collums to origional details. |
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 2017 |
 Before renovation. |
