History job with a twist: Keeping museum visitors happy and buying nifty souvenirs

One local resident, Jane Riley, has had a steady hand in helping to preserve Manassas Museum’s collection of riveting stories chronicling the people and places of Manassas.

Today, Riley is the museum’s visitor services supervisor and manager of the museum’s gift store, Echoes. Her dedication to the museum winds back 25 years earlier when she first started with the Manassas Museum Associates, a group that organizes fundraisers and support for programs.

In 1991, the Manassas Museum opened on the current site in a new building. However, Riley remembers when the museum was first housed from 1974 until 1990 in a small brick building on Main Street, which formerly was the Manassas National Bank dating to 1896. “We’d go to that little museum once in a while, and I took my son, Mike, too,” she said. “I loved the people and the museum.”

In 1991, she saw an ad in the Manassas Journal Messenger newspaper for a part-time position as coordinator for the Manassas Museum Associates. “Ann Walser Harrover, Shirley Guy and Doug Harvey interviewed me for this job,” she said. The museum had just opened in February 1991, and Riley started her new position with the associates after that.

This year marks the museum’s 25th anniversary at its current site.

In 2000, when the manager position for the museum store became available, Riley was approached, and thought, “Well, ok. I knew the stock and the Manassas story, so I agreed.” Scott Harris, the director at the time, interviewed her for this full-time position, which she started in September 2000.

Manassas Museum is part of the Manassas Museum System, which is part of Manassas City’s Department of Community Development.
As of July 1, 2015, museum admission has been free. Now, visitors only pay for special events such as hard-hat tours of Liberia, bike tours, van tours and summer camps. “We get lots of international visitors; recently, we had a couple from Australia,” Riley said. “There are many from England, Germany and Canada.”

Riley works with three other full-time staff members : Mary Helen Dellinger, curator; Doug Horhota, programs coordinator; and Jean Griffith, museum administrative assistant.

In January, the museum underwent renovations to improve the visitor experience and, on Feb. 2, hosted a grand reopening.

Dellinger, curator since 2012, added, “We’ve updated some of our permanent displays and are excited to show some never-before-seen items. Some artifacts that were on display since 1991 were replaced with pieces that were in storage. Labels have been updated with new information, and some display cases have a new look.”

In addition to managing Echoes, Riley is the buyer for the store; “Now, that’s the fun part,” she admitted. Inside Echoes, visitors can purchase limited-edition prints, history books related to the region, Civil War collectibles, home décor items, T-shirts and children’s toys and books.
Riley also schedules the museum’s free book talks, which are usually on Sundays. Upcoming are Feb. 21, 1:30-2:30 p.m.; Charles A. Mills, a local historian who will talk about his book, “Historic Cemeteries of Northern Virginia;” and Feb. 27, 2-3 p.m., John J. Hennessy, chief historian and chief of interpretation at Freder-icksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, will speak about his book, “The First Battle of Manassas: An End to Innocence, July 18-21, 1861.”

The current exhibit, “What the Civil War Soldier Carried: Selections from the Collection of Dr. Charles Poland,” opened Feb. 2 and continues through Feb. 28.

When it comes to all the skills Riley uses on her job, some include technology (point-of-sales software for secure credit card processing, Internet research, accounting software for monthly budget reports on revenue/stats to the director), engineering (redesigning new front counter required layout design), art (sense of colors, design, displaying items in store to look appealing, showcasing items in exhibits) and math (ensuring daily deposits are accurate, tracking revenue/expenses).

“When people come to the museum, they’ll find a welcoming and warm place with cool stuff to see,” Riley ended. “It gives people a sense of place. We live in such an historic area; I love Virginia. My mother always called Virginia, ‘God’s country.’”

Manassas Museum is located at 9101 Prince William Street in the City of Manassas. For more information, readers can go to   http://www.manassasmuseum.org or call 703-368-1873.