The Center for Historic Preservation at Ball State received a $10,000 grant from the Efroymson Fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation to prepare National Register nominations for three of Indiana's historic stone bridges.

Graduate student Shawn Niemi, who has an assistantship at the Center, is currently researching and writing the nominations for the bridges with assistance from Dr. James Cooper, Indiana's foremost authority on historic bridges.

The Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana, which aided the Center in applying for the grant, will review the nominations and will forward them to the Indiana State Historic Preservation Office for listing on the National Register.

"The foundation hopes that nomination of three of the historic bridges will help build more public awareness of their importance to the Hoosier landscape and spur more efforts to preserve the surviving structures," said Mark Dollase, vice president of the foundation's preservation services.

The bridge nominations began in January and will conclude by June.

The Center for Historic Preservation is part of Ball State's College of Architecture and Planning.