The Vermont Legislature honored historian Howard Coffin in 2004 with a resolution citing his decade of literary and advocacy efforts to record and preserve Vermont’s Civil War history. Coffin is the author of three books on the role of Vermonters in the Civil War and has served on the national Civil War Sites Advisory Commission. His work has helped save 500 acres of the Wilderness Battlefield. He has served many years on the Coolidge Foundation board and in 1996 was instrumental in facilitating a grant for the Coolidge Foundation from the federal government for education, preservation, and endowment.