News
ShareAlum selected as QHC Curator
04/07/06
— Ruth Brindle Dobyns ’99
Ruth Brindle Dobyns is no stranger to Wilmington College, Friends’ history or how to run a museum or educational center, so when plans were formulated for a Quaker Heritage Center, the College needed to look no further than the 1999 alumna.
She is committed to making the Meriam R. Hare Quaker Heritage Center a place where visitors seek “illumination, inspiration and reflection.”
Dobyns said the Center’s exhibits and programs will highlight Friends as an American “conscience” reminding persons that there is “that of God in everyone.” Quakers have a long history of activism on such issues as peacemaking, civil rights, racism and social justice.
“The center honors this historical contribution and the living tradition of Friends, an ongoing commitment to the struggle for peace and justice,” Dobyns added. “This will be a place where questioning, reflection and discussion flourish. The exhibits and related programs challenge visitors to ‘be of good faith in the world.’
“What did it mean to be a Friend in 1630, 1776, 1810, 1914, 1945, 1969 — and what does it mean to be a Friend today?” she said. “The Quaker Heritage Center exists to challenge others to act.”
Since its opening in late September, the Quaker Heritage Center has featured an exhibit of artifacts and documents from the collection of its benefactor, Meriam R. Hare. The gallery formally will open Feb. 2 with an exhibit highlighting the American Civil Rights Movement, including Ohio’s significant role in the Underground Railroad.
Dobyns, a Quaker, is a 1999 Wilmington College graduate with an advanced degree in public history and museum studies from the University of South Carolina.
Allen Schwartz, director of programming at the Center, holds degrees from Denison University and the University of Illinois, and comes to WC from the Newberry Library, where he was director of the Chicago Metro History Education Center for 15 years.
