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Seeking Asylum and Georgia’s Old Capital Heritage Center (GOCHC) at the Depot hosted their second trivia night fundraiser, July 15 at the Brick.
The event fundraised for The Depot Project, an ongoing restoration to turn the building into an interactive museum called the heritage center. The center will preserve Georgia and United States history from visits by the earliest Native American hunters, through the frontier and antebellum years, to the 21st century and will include a special exhibit dedicated to Central State Hospital (CHS).
“The Depot renovation is our ongoing project to help create a museum that will preserve both our local history and United States history,” said Amy Wright, executive director Georgia’s Old Capital Heritage Center at the Depot. “Jessica (Whitehead) plans the trivia night fundraisers for us and has been an active supporter to our project, so we are very thankful for her.”
The event was sponsored by Seeking Asylum LLC., a company owned by photographer Jessica Whitehead, who is also a part of the GOCHC Board of Trustees. Whitehead originally debuted her Central State Hospital photography exhibit, Seeking Asylum, at The Depot on Giving Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2022. In her exhibit, Whitehead featured 35 photographs of the inside and outside of the CHS campus with the goal to advocate discussion of mental health and its treatment.
Since its debut, Seeking Asylum has become a permanent exhibit in the W.H. Smith Building in downtown Milledgeville and is now working to help with fundraising efforts for The Depot Project. According to the company’s mission statement, every canvas sale and future photography book sale generates a donation to The Depot Project as part of Seeking Asylum’s mission to preserve CHS history.
“This is the second trivia night that I have sponsored to raise money for the renovation of the Depot. Our first trivia night was based solely on Central State Hospital history but I planned this trivia night to also expand to Baldwin County History,” said Whitehead.
Whitehead visited Baldwin County’s Visitor Center to learn more about Baldwin County’s history and create questions for the trivia night. She used the Historic Walking Tour Guide as the basis of the Baldwin County History questions and pulled questions from the previous trivia night for Central State Hospital history questions. In total, there were 25 questions.
“The Depot will not only preserve CHS history but Baldwin County history so I wanted to ensure that the questions were balanced for both topics. There were 15 Baldwin County History questions and 10 Central State Hospital questions,” said Whitehead.
Ten teams were present for the trivia night and battled it out in five rounds to win. The first place winner was Joe Wright. The second palace winner was Carol Grant and the third palace winner was a paired team made up of Wanda Millians and Marion Robinson.
“This fundraiser was a success and I am happy to say that all of our winners were Baldwin County locals,” said Wright. “We raised a total of $350 towards the renovation, which was a bit more than our previous trivia night.”