The Bill Monroe Memorial Music Park & Campground is up for sale once more, and the Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundation is on a mission to purchase the property, as a means of preserving the historic festival. Those who are interested can contribute directly from the foundation’s website.

Another way you can help is to vote for the foundation in the Pepsi Refresh Project. This is a program Pepsi is running to help people with good ideas, make those ideas reality. They are giving away grants each month for varying amounts from $5K to $250K. The Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundation has applied for one of the $250K grants this month. The money would be used to purchase the festival grounds and keep the festival running year after year.

Voting is purely fan based and each individual can vote as many as 10 times per day, from now through April 30, 2010. Voting does require signing in by either giving Pepsi your email address, or using the Facebook Connect app. Currently the Foundation is ranked at #138 for the month.

If you’re up for it, visit refresheverything.com/savethebeanblossom and cast your vote(s).

We have written several times about the Bean Blossom Foundation, and their work to preserve the Bill Monroe Music Park in Indiana. This is the park previously owned by Mr. Monroe, and the site of the festival he hosted there from 1967 until his death in 1996. That festival continues at the park to this day as the Bill Monroe Memorial Bluegrass Festival, which is also the home of Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Hall of Fame & Country Star Museum.

Jim Peva, longtime Friend of Bill, and author of Bean Blossom: Its People and Its Music (a photographic history of the town and the festival), posted a number of his classic Monroe photos on the Bean Blossom site. They include some wonderful shots of Bill on stage from the 1960s forward, and some lovely intimate photos that only a family friend could capture.

Here are a few of the images from Peva’s collection:

See all of the photos online – and don’t forget to make a donation to the Bean Blossom Foundation if you are able.

Here’s an idea for those who would like to support a worthy cause with their Christmas gift-giving, one that also speaks to the pesky “what do you get for the bluegrass fan who has everything” dilemma.

The Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundation is still offering personalized bricks for the Bean Blossom Memorial Brick Wall, adjacent to the performance stage on the grounds of the Bill Monroe Memorial Music Park & Campground in Bean Blossom, IN. Mr. Monroe once owned and operated this property, and the foundation is trying to raise the funds necessary to purchase the park and operate it as an enduring monument to Bill Monroe’s music.

You can hear their direct appeal below in this audio file which the foundation created as a PSA…

You can find full details about having a brick personalized for your favorite bluegrass lover on The Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundation web site.

Well, it will be a special brick if you take the The Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundationup on their offer and adopt a brick in their Memorial Brick Wall Project.

The Foundation is trying to raise sufficient funds to purchase the Bill Monroe Memorial Music Park & Campground in Bean Blossom, IN, once owned and operated by Big Mon himself. The fate of the park has been uncertain in recent years as current owner (and former Blue Grass Boy) Dwight Dillman has announced plans to sell the property.

The wall is being erected near the music stage. A brick can be personalized with 3 lines of text for $100 prior to construction, going up to $125 after the wall is up. The fee is fully tax deductible and proceeds go to the Foundation’s goal of taking over the park and Bill Monroe Museum on site.

To purchase a brick and support the The Bean Blossom Jamboree Foundationup, you may contact them by phone (877-989-BBJF),or email them from their web site. You may also download the PDF order form for a mail-in donation.