As Ellen Rosenthal rides the commuter train to class in Stockholm, Sweden, she debates whether she should get off at her stop to get to class. The Nordic Museum, Skansen, and Moderna Museet are beckoning just down the track. She is supposed to be learning about art during her gap year, but it seems to make more sense to ride a few more stops and actually go to the art.
Rosenthal rides on. It’s the early 1970s, and the Swedes are on to something with the immersive, interactive experience they have implemented in many museums. She recalls how empty the museums always felt in the United States. “At the time, the approach to museums was if you had to ask, you shouldn’t be there,” Rosenthal remembers. “And that’s why many didn’t visit them.”
Her museum-hopping experience during her gap year helped her realize how she could make a difference: “transform museums.”
That’s what drew her to Carnegie Mellon after her undergraduate days. She earned a Master’s in public policy management in 1984—a degree that she says taught her how to work both for and with the community.
Today, Rosenthal applies her skills and her passion at Conner Prairie Interactive History Park, an outdoor living-history museum based in Fishers, Ind., which recreates life in the state during the 19th century. Under her direction, as president and CEO since 2005, the museum has become as hands-on as possible and the park’s attendance has increased a remarkable 270%, welcoming some 340,000 visitors last year alone.
For her achievements, she was awarded a 2014 Torchbearer Award by the Indiana Commission for Women, an honor given to those who have broken down barriers and made Indiana a better place to work, live, and raise a family.
—Elizabeth Shestak (DC’03)
