(PRESS RELEASE / THE VILLAGE REPORTER)
NEW VILLAGE FEATURE … Andi Erbskorn (right), the director of external engagement at Sauder Village, told Archbold Rotarians about a new program that the Village hopes to have ready when Sauder Village opens for its 2025 season in May. The program will honor the longest serving volunteer by establishing the Carolyn Sauder Education Center. The Center will streamline and consolidate all of Sauder Village’s internal and external education efforts in one location – the museum. The program was arranged by Jennie Gilroy (left).
PRESS RELEASE – Sauder Village plans to enhance its ability to fulfill the mission that its founder Erie Sauder established when he launched his idea to bring the agricultural history of Northwest Ohio alive.
Simply stated, he believed: “You can put all of this history in books, but it will never talk like the tangible history will.”
So, he went about creating a museum within an historical village that used re-enactors to explain what, why and how behind the taming of the Great Black Swamp when Sauder Village opened in 1976.
Andi Erbskorn, the director of external engagement, told Archbold Rotarians recently that every year about 15,000 youth – many arriving in yellow school buses – tour the Village.
“In one year, our re-enactors and staff will interact with more children than a teacher will in their career,” she said. Although this is a new position for Erbskorn with Sauder Village, it isn’t her first experience here.
From 1990 to 2014 she served as the museum’s curator. She said that she thoroughly enjoyed being part of Sauder Village then and looks forward to her new role now.
When the museum opens this spring, she said a whole new chapter is expected to open with it – the Carolyn Sauder Education Center.
It will be located in the part of the museum building that previously housed the quilt shop, which has been moved to the visitor center. Erbskorn noted that Carolyn Sauder, Erie’s daughter-in-law, trained to be a teacher.
Using that background, she has been deeply involved in the Village’s educational component from the very beginning. She said it’s only fitting that the education center recognizes Carolyn’s role in making Erie’s dream come to life.
The space previously occupied by the quilt shop is being renovated to include in-person classrooms for the various classes that the museum offers as well as provide distance and remote learning options.
Office space for museum staff is included as well as space where museum and village displays can be created.
Erbskorn said that the Carolyn Sauder Education Center will help fulfill the Village’s mission: To foster a unique environment that explores the past, engages the senses and inspires wonder.