Director Address

I want to personally thank our donors, members, visitors, and volunteers for welcoming me into my first full year in the Executive Director position with open arms. Your support means the world to me, and I am humbled to lead such an incredible organization. We had an action-packed 2019, and with your support we were able to accomplish many projects: our friends at Valu Home Center helped to give our Paint Room exhibit a fresh new look; we hosted 5 free admission days over the summer due to generous sponsorship donations from Pioneer Printers, Niagara Regional FCU, Thomas Turtle, Ross Service, Aquasol, and our city of North Tonawanda officials; over 35 tour groups visited the museum this year including, the American Theater Organ Society who brought over 200 theater organ enthusiasts to our site; and we launched Hops for Herschell, a new fundraising event at Flying Bison Brewery. What a fun, productive year.

I truly believe none of our accomplishments would have been possible without our volunteers. Their generosity overwhelms me, and I am very grateful to have such a supportive group of people behind me. One of my highlights of 2019 was getting to have one-on-one conversations with many of our volunteers, and learning what inspired them to be a volunteer at the Herschell Carrousel Factory Museum. My door is always open to volunteers and their ideas. Please stop in and say, “hi!"

We have a lot of exciting projects scheduled for 2020. You’ll notice we have a new logo featured in this issue of The Carrousel Courier. This will be the museum’s new look moving forward, and you’ll see it on some of our gift shop merchandise this year. Speaking of the gift shop, our big winter project has been remodeling the space. Make sure to stop in and check out some of the new products when we open.