AUSTIN, Texas —
This month, the Texas Historical Commission (THC) launched its Historic Overnights initiative, a new and unique way for travelers to discover in-depth details about historic places and experience local history in a more immersive fashion through the state’s official heritage travel website, TexasTimeTravel.com.
Galveston is the pilot city for this initiative, which will expand to other communities across the state. The initiative will promote greater investment in heritage tourism, cultivate thoughtful historic home ownership and provide tools a community can use to highlight and promote its abundance of historically significant lodging.
The THC and Visit Galveston partnered with local archivists, historians and property owners to uncover the in-depth history of each building and its original inhabitants. Thanks to project partners Galveston Historical Foundation and the Rosenberg Library, over a dozen detailed property biographies are now available to potential guests. Delve into the stories of Galveston’s historic overnight properties at TexasTimeTravel.com/Galveston-overnights.
About THC’s Historic Overnights
This opportunity is geared toward small and mid-sized communities with a high density of historic overnight lodging properties such as hotels, bed and breakfasts, and short-term rentals. The THC’s Heritage Tourism Program staff works with local archivists and historians to lead community workshops on the use of archival resources to research the history of properties; how to use biographies, documents, news clippings and photographs to tell more engaging stories; and how to evoke a house’s material history through interpretive signage and artifact displays.
The THC’s Heritage Tourism Program supports the development and promotion of high-quality, place-based heritage experiences in communities across Texas. In addition to the Historic Overnights initiative and TexasTimeTravel.com, the program works closely with the 10 Texas Heritage Trail Regions across the state, produces heritage travel guides and consults with communities through projects such as Museum on Main Street, a partnership with the Smithsonian Institution. For more information or to participate, email mallory.laurel@thc.texas.gov.
4/25/2023 BC
