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Longtime education director finishes 35 years at THNOC
On February 28 The Collection bid farewell to Sue Laudeman, who, in her 35 years on staff, revolutionized The Shop as well as the educational outreach program, extending The Collection’s impact on and interaction with the public tremendously. Having spearheaded projects related to the 1984 World’s Fair, New Orleans’s culinary heritage, and coastal wetlands erosion, Laudeman is stepping down as a fulltime staffer but plans to stay in regular contact with the institution she says has always felt like home.
“I’ve had really mixed emotions about [retiring],” she says. “It was never a ‘job’ for me. I love what I’ve done, and The Collection allowed me to grow in so many ways.”
When Laudeman started at The Collection in 1978, she had already journeyed through two major roles, first as a social worker covering Jefferson Parish—following her graduation cum laude from Newcomb College, where she studied sociology and psychology—and later as a mother. Laudeman always loved working with and for children, whether her own or those under government assistance, and her joy in helping young people would serve her and THNOC well in the years to come.
After visiting The Collection as an officer of the Junior League of New Orleans, she became determined to develop a relationship with the museum and research center. “I came here, took a tour of the history galleries . . . and I was completely fascinated. I didn’t really know I knew anything about Louisiana history, but apparently I did from living [in New Orleans] all my life. I started seriously studying Louisiana history and have been involved ever since. I joined as a volunteer, and then two weeks later I was hired.”
After starting out as a docent, Laudeman was promoted to take over management of The Shop. “They sent me around to visit museum shops of different sizes,” Laudeman recalls. “I went to the Museum Store Association and learned about what a museum shop should be.” In the ensuing months, Laudeman phased in an inventory that became the blueprint for The Shop as it exists today: gifts related to the collection, books and other media tying in to exhibitions and New Orleans or Louisiana history, and prints from THNOC’s art and manuscript holdings.
“I never saw a day where Sue didn’t approach the job like it was her first day on the job,” says Diane Plauche, who managed The Shop after Laudeman. “It was amazing.”
Eventually Laudeman became curator of education, and she developed teacher training programs, student workbooks on
Sue Laudeman displays the History Channel award she and The Collection received in 2005 for the culinary heritage program A Dollop of History in Every Bite.
local history, and field trips. She helmed the development of A Dollop of History in Every Bite, a program for Orleans Parish schoolchildren to learn about and document their own culinary heritage. Conducted from 2005 through 2007, the program earned an award from the History Channel, which Laudeman and a cohort traveled to Washington, DC, to accept.
After Hurricane Katrina and the levee breaches, Laudeman developed a program to teach Lafourche and Terrebonne Parish students about coastal wetlands loss. “Students studied what the wetlands are about, why they’re important to preserve, and how they can become involved in helping save the wetlands for future generations,” she says. “The kids interviewed their eldest relatives about the changes to the wetlands they saw in their lifetimes, so it became much more personal to them.”
Laudeman says she made the decision to retire on December 14, 2012, her 75th birthday. In addition to spending time with her family-—she and her husband, Elliott, have two children, Keppy and Susu, and two teenage grandchildren, Polk and Elliott—she plans to work on publishing a children’s book manuscript she wrote several years ago, titled “A Knight in Lapland: The Twelfth Night Revelers and Mother Goose’s Tea Party.” And, of course, she’ll still spend time at The Collection.
“No one exemplifies the concept of family [at The Collection] more than Sue Laudeman,” says THNOC Collections Manager Warren Woods.
“I just love this place,” Laudeman says. “I don’t plan to sever my ties, because it’s been just such a wonderful place to work, and I want to come back as a volunteer and continue my association with it.”
—Molly Reid
The Historic New Orleans Collection Quarterly 11