“Ask a Curator Day” is Here Again!
By Katie Burke, Museum Specialist
Do you have questions about stamps, stamp collecting or the history of the postal service? Would you like to find out what our curators love about their jobs, or which exhibits have been their favorites? Well, now’s your chance -– the Postal Museum is participating in “Ask A Curator Day” once again!
Ask a Curator Day, a worldwide Twitter Q&A with dozens of participating museums, is taking place tomorrow, Wednesday, September 16. Several of our expert curators will be on hand from 9 AM to 4:30 PM to answer all your questions, so start thinking about what you’d like to ask!
How to participate: Follow us on Twitter (we’re @PostalMuseum), and ask us questions about stamps, postal history or museum work using the hashtag #askacurator. Our curators are so knowledgeable that fitting their answers into the 140 character Twitter limit might be a challenge, but we’ll do our best!
Participating curators:
Nancy Pope, Historian and Curator
Nancy has worked with the items in this collection since joining the Smithsonian Institution in 1984. In 2011 she curated the museum’s new permanent exhibit Systems at Work, which delves into the inside world of U.S. postal operations to answer a common visitor question: “How does my mail get where it’s going?” Nancy can field questions in all areas of postal history, but her particular interests are transportation and technology history.
Calvin Mitchell, Assistant Curator of Philately
Calvin specializes in African American History and Philately and Military Postal History. After playing an instrumental role in NPM’s recent exhibit “Freedom Just Around the Corner: Black America from Civil War to Civil Rights,” which opened in February, 2015, Calvin is now working on an exhibit about stamp art and design. Calvin is ready and willing to tackle all of your philatelic (stamp-related) questions.
Our curators are looking forward to answering your questions! And remember, Ask a Curator Day is primarily a Twitter event, but if you’re not on Twitter you can always reach the museum through Facebook, commenting on blog posts, or in other ways:
About the Author
Katie Burke: "I’m currently a Museum Specialist. I’ve been at the Postal Museum since 2005, previously working in the Curatorial Department and on the Web Team."
