Many thanks to all who donated the Homestead Project! We have approximately $15,000. This is a long way from our goal, but it is a good start! Many fundraising projects will be happening this year – we will keep you posted on the progress!

What is the Homestead Project?

The Homestead Project is a joint venture between the JRTCA and the JRT Museum & Crawford Library. The goal is to purchase a property that will be suitable to house both the JRTCA offices and the Museum, and to hold trials, educational training, practice days, fieldwork, and more.

Ideally it would be large enough to hold the JRTCA National Trial. Keeping the Museum together with the JRTCA is important as their work and purposes overlap and are essential to the protection and preservation of the TRUE Jack Russell Terrier. It will be a tribute to Ailsa Crawford, the JRTCA’s founder.

Why is the Homestead needed?

The Homestead is necessary to ensure the future of both the JRTCA and the Museum by providing a permanent home with fixed costs that will allow it to generate income to pay for itself.

For many years now the JRTCA has been renting costly office space and has faced several large moves over the past 15 years. Each of these moves resulted in expensive moving costs as well as increased rental costs. With the addition of The Museum, rental requirements have doubled both in size and cost; the Museum has already faced one move and has already outgrown our current space.

There has been much uncertainty and confusion during the past decade since the variants of the Jack Russell Terrier were introduced by the AKC. Education is more important than ever and reaching the people to educate is more difficult. The JRTCA is smaller, and although it is now a very dedicated group of members interested in the breed for the right reasons, it is also a large financial burden for the membership to bear.

The Club and Museum cannot continue to ask members for more donations and increased fees as operating costs continue to rise. A permanent home that could generate income to pay for itself would solve that problem – and stop the waste of membership money going down the tubes to pay large rent each month.

The Museum operates strictly on donations and fundraisers – there are no members. To date just enough money is being raised to cover operating costs, and not enough to pursue educational planning efforts of the Museum.

There are many plans in the works for educational projects through both the Museum and the JRTCA to promote and preserve the TRUE Jack Russell Terrier. A permanent location will allow this to happen and ensure our future. Part of those plans include the ability to take this education on the road to visit extensively throughout the country.

The Homestead will provide many benefits to members and Jack Russell lovers throughout the country – it will be a training facility, a practice facility, home of sanctioned trials, an educational Museum and Library, perhaps a Rescue foster area, a place to store our equipment, a central office, and most importantly a place for Jack Russell enthusiasts to gather enjoy and learn from everything Jack Russell!

What do we need to do?

First and foremost, we need to raise funds to have a substantial down payment on a property. Both the Museum and the JRTCA have implemented separate bank accounts for just this purpose. We need to have a substantial down payment before we can seriously look for the property. The more we have to put down, the lower the monthly payments will be and the better a property we can find.

What can Members and Friends of the true JRT do?

Members, and anyone who cares about this terrier, can of course offer donations – there are close to 2,000 members in the JRTCA – if every member donated $25 (includes every adult member in a family membership) we could immediately raise close to $50,000. Smaller amounts of $5-20 would also help significantly, and of course if you can do more than $25 that would be wonderful – no donation is too large or too small. This will give us a great start towards our goal.

We do not expect to raise all of the money needed through member donations – JRTCA members and any true Jack Russell enthusiasts can help by doing fundraisers, no matter how large or small, in your area – every bit helps no matter how large or small.

Here in this area we are considering a monthly Bingo at our local American Legion. We are looking at fun days, raffles, 50/50’s, possible events such as crab feasts or bull roasts – all to benefit the Homestead Project. They do not need to be Jack Russell related. You can do fundraising at any level in your local areas.

A photo contest will be announced on the web site shortly – it will be lots of fun and you can get all of your friends to vote for your terrier. A calendar will be produced using the top 12 photos.

The Museum is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit – donations are tax deductible. The JRTCA is an educational non-profit, and therefore not tax deductible. To donate to the Museum, checks can be made out to the JRT Museum, PayPal payments can be sent to PayPal@jackrussellterriermuseum.com, or you can call the office with a credit card.

Check out Amazon Smile – you can find the JRT Museum there. Many of us shop Amazon, and a portion of your purchase could be donated through their non-profit program.

All funds marked HOMESTEAD go into a separate account for this purpose and we will keep everyone posted of our progress during the coming year!
Talk to other people who are not members – many may be willing to donate to this project. Once a property is obtained, it will be open to all at times for education and training!

The JRTCA and the Museum are working on many plans to ensure our futures – but we can’t do it alone.

A Development Committee has been formed chaired by Wayne May with assistance from Jim Newman, Jack Batzer, Roy Izzo and Lisanne Gray. If any of you would like to work with them, please call the office at 410-560-9958. If any of you are experienced in fundraising and have any ideas – or would like to be involved in planning – we welcome your input. Please call or email!!!

This is a VERY IMPORTANT project. Ailsa Crawford wanted so much to see this happen and wanted to help us financially. Unfortunately, she passed away before she could help or see it happen. This will be her legacy, our legacy, and the JRTCA’s future. Let’s make it happen!

We are very busy this Spring and looking forward to a good year for the Museum. Fundraising is our major effort this year. We got a bit behind last year as activities were so restricted.

Our annual Museum Benefit Trial is planned for June 12 & 13th in Littlestown, PA. It is a great trial site and there will plenty for every terrier to do! Please join us! If you are unable to attend, please sponsor a class. The funds from this Benefit Trial cover a significant portion of the operating expenses required annually to keep the Museum going.

The big project this year is an all-out effort to raise funds for the Homestead Project. If you are not familiar with this project, please keep following our efforts – we will keep you updated as we progress. Finding a permanent location for the Museum and the JRTCA is extremely important – and can ensure that these organizations will be able to continue to preserve and protect the TRUE Jack Russell Terrier for many years to come.  The Homestead will make the Museum to be more accessible, promote educational days, put more training in place available to all, help with Rescue, and so much more. It will be self-funding and will be “home” to all true Jack Russell lovers.

We are researching any and all fundraising options to make the funds grow quickly so that this can become a reality sooner than later. This is a joint project with the JRTCA. So far the JRTCA and the Museum have collected approximately $15,000. That may seem a long way from our goal – we need about $200,000 to buy a large enough property – but it is a great start.

There are many fundraising projects being planned – a photo contest will be up on the website soon. Raffles and silent auctions, bingo nights, fun days, bull roasts or similar events, are all good options that can be done in your local areas – please see what you can do to help. If people all around the country help in this fundraising effort it will grow fast!

Some of the educational projects for the Museum & Library that are underway are videos for all Jack Russell activities, history as it has progressed since the early Fox Terrier days, more books for the library, documenting and preserving the many magazine/newspaper articles from over the years and more. A major goal is a traveling Museum/Library that would consist of a large trailer equipped with key items that could be hauled around the country to educate the general public on our terrier.

We hope to find grants that will assist with some of this – particularly the traveling Museum/Library.  All of this of course will be a large effort, both financially and administratively. If you would like to help with any of this, please step forward – we welcome all who would like to participate!

Call any Board member, or the office at 410-560-9958.

The Oct 31/Nov 1, 2020 Museum Trial results have been posted to the trial page.

Unfortunately the August Trial is canceled. Restrictions have tightened in Pennsylvania as well as other nearby states.

This is a difficult year for all, we truly appreciate all the hard work our volunteer team has done and the donations. We will have the trial as soon as the environment is safe to do so. Please stay well and continue to support the museum – it’s going to be a tough year to keep things going. We will post any updates on rescheduling as we know them.

Thank you!!

The Museum Board of Directors

With the COVID-19 virus keeping most of the country on lock-down we are forced to consider whether or not to cancel our June Benefit Trial scheduled for June 6-7. The decision has not been made at this time; we will make the decision in early May. This is the major fund-raiser for the Museum’s annual operating expenses, so we truly hope we can proceed. If not, we will reschedule for later in the year.  Please remember that the Museum operates ENTIRELY on donations. If you are able to make a donation it would be greatly appreciated!

We are continuing to fulfill our purpose of EDUCATION to the general public and continuing to expand the web site and the Museum itself. We are working closely with the JRTCA towards purchasing a property that will permanently house the Museum. This is very important – we cannot expand and fulfill our mission without space to do so, and space that will be a permanent investment and prevent more costly moves in the future. Our efforts are delayed due to the problems in the country currently.

While things are quiet, we are not asleep! We are still working for the preservation of the true Jack Russell Terrier!

Thank you!​