Annual Report to the Members 2021

BY: DON PENDERGRAFT, DIRECTOR OF REGIONAL MUSEUMS

The museum staff would like to thank you for your continued support. During the last 18 months, we have endured, and to quote an old North Carolina saying, “Bad weather makes good timber.”

We are members of Count On Me NC, with a healthy and safe environment waiting for your visit.

The museum is emerging from the long pause, and through the journey, we made progress in understanding the needs of schoolchildren and lifelong learners. We adapted our interpretive methods to provide distance learning. We purchased new video equipment to send virtual presentations into your homes and around the world. The museum held virtual and real presentations to accommodate reduced audience sizes in the auditorium, with broadcasting over the internet. The museum has become a part of the international forum of historical offerings. We want to provide you, as members, with new experiences of the past to help find answers from lost histories. I hope you’ll enjoy and be part of these new ways to promote culture and history.

Exhibit staff members have constructed and compiled a large body of traveling exhibits. These exhibits are traveling throughout the state, and some are even being shared with historic sites in Virginia and Florida. They are free and available for groups in the Albemarle region. Please let us know if you’d like a list of the exhibits for use in your libraries, schools, and public spaces. The exhibits are designed to travel, helping schools to easily display, learn local histories, and save travel expenses.

The visitation numbers throughout 2020-2021 dropped drastically as COVID-19 limited the number of people allowed in the museum's enclosed spaces. In an attempt to encourage more visitors to return to the museum, we have produced three videos to promote supporting the museum by donations, volunteering, or serving on the Friends of the Museum of the Albemarle board. Please view our new videos on YouTube on the Museum of the Albemarle channel. We are also currently placing public service announcements on WUNC, North Carolina Public Radio; these are heard across the state.

One of the newest improvements is the sign for the museum on the front atrium glass windows.

This year we celebrate new beginnings as we embrace the past! Please join us.