The following is an interview with Lauren McCormack, executive director of Marblehead Museum, conducted by Discover Marblehead. Marblehead Museum has four sites in town and offers lectures, programs, exhibits and walking tours. The museum is a nonprofit that operates solely through donations, membership fees and fundraising. To learn more about its upcoming exhibits and programs or to make a donation, go to marbleheadmuseum.org
Tell us about the Marblehead Museum and the programs you offer the community. Marblehead Museum & Historical Society, Inc. is a private, nonprofit museum founded in 1898 to preserve, protect and promote Marblehead’s past as a means of enriching the present. We have four sites in town: the 1768 Jeremiah Lee Mansion, JOJ Frost Gallery & Carolyn Lynch Education Center, Civil War/Grand Army of the Republic exhibit in the Old Town House, as well as our newest acquisition, the Jeremiah Lee Brick Kitchen & Slave Quarters next to the Lee Mansion. We have an object and archival collection of over 60,000 items from Marblehead’s past and invite researchers and genealogists to take advantage of our resources. We offer lectures, walking tours, programs and events year-round, both hybrid and in-person.
What exciting projects are you working on currently? The museum is currently working to preserve, rehabilitate and interpret the 1768 Jeremiah Lee Brick Kitchen & Slave Quarters at 157 Washington St. Thanks to a generous donation by Standley Goodwin in 2021, we were able to purchase the building, which was built by the Lee family to serve as a detached kitchen, coach house and living quarters for their enslaved individuals. The building is fascinating, and we spent over two years working with architectural historians, archaeologists and other scholars to study how it has changed over time. Now, we’re working to secure it for the next 250 years. At the same time, we’re working closely with scholars and public historians to develop an exhibit on the first floor about the enslaved experience in Marblehead. The second floor will be a new state-of-the-art archive and research center so we can better preserve and share our historical documents and photos. The entire project budget is just over $1.4 million, and we’re actively seeking donations and grants to meet our goal.
What is your favorite spot in Marblehead, and why? I love walking around Old Burial Hill. It’s quiet and peaceful, but it’s also an opportunity to see so much of Marblehead’s past in one place — its heroes and heroines, as well as the everyday people who, over the years, made Marblehead the amazing town it was and is.
What is something people would be surprised to learn about you? Before I came to the Marblehead Museum, I worked at the USS Constitution Museum and was privileged to be on board USS Constitution when she sailed in 2012, in honor of the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, for only the second time since the 19th century.
This spotlight is a weekly feature published in partnership with Discover Marblehead. To learn more, visit discovermhd.com
