Becky Wehle fosters family legacy at the museum ‘everyone loves’

Becky Wehle, 45, was just three-years-old when the museum opened. Grandfather John Wehle invested his funds from running Genesee Brewing Company into a dream, one that he conceived in 1966 and became a reality in 1976.

Today Genesee Country Village & Museum (GCVM) is the largest living historic museum in New York state and maintains the third largest collection of history buildings in the United States.

The 600-acre complex hosts 68 historic structures furnished with 15,000 artifacts, interpreted by staff  in period-appropriate dress. GCVM is a major tourist attraction for our region.

Among the dozens of buildings preserved in the historic village are George Eastman’s childhood home, the house of Col. Nathaniel Rochester, mansions of the era, an opera house, a working farm with animals, a mercantile, a schoolhouse, a town hall, plus two churches.

Wehle started her career in the museum world, working in public relations for George Eastman Museum right out of college and now, after many years with the University of Rochester working in advancement, she has returned to her museum roots. It’s in her blood and she has served on the GCVM board for 19 years and even had her wedding in the historic village.

Appointed interim director on July 1, 2016, the job became official in 2017.  Wehle already is expanding educational programs and this year the museum welcomed a website and its first guide book in 25 years.

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You have been a trustee of GCVM since 1997, and now, you are the president and CEO. Is there anything you are now seeing through new eyes?

Yes, the magnitude of what it takes to get the place running and the work that goes literally 24 hours a day, from taking care of the animals and making sure the buildings are safe and staff  are welcoming visitors in a friendly and helpful way. There’s a lot that goes on. I had some of appreciation for that as a board member but the most interesting part has been digging in and seeing this all  firsthand as a staff member.

You have been associated with the museum your entire life. What is the response you get when you tell people where you work?

Almost everyone has a story. It’s amazing the positive responses I get from pretty much everywhere, from people who love this museum and want to talk about it. Have you ever had anyone say, “I don’t like it there”? I have never. Have you?

As a mom as well as a museum CEO, do you see the need for more educational programs?

We certainly are making ourselves more relevant to kids today. Sure, the 19th century is pretty far into the past for them, but there are a lot of connections between then and now. And there are lessons in looking at what kids their age did in the 19th century, how their clothes were made or where their food came from.

We are integrating educational and cultural experiences more,  field studies and also STEM experiences. Over the past year we’ve made a concerted effort focused on four buildings: our carpentry shop, tailor shop, drug store, and print shop. In the tailor shop we can show how two-dimensional objects become 3D objects and in the drug store we explore chemistry. We are moving our print shop down the hill three houses to make more room so visitors can see a printing press at work. In spring 2018 we will have a telegraph set-up spanning two rooms, so students can experience technology used during the Civil War, which was essentially 19th century texting.

What do you want fellow parents to know about Genesee Country Village & Museum?

You can have experiences here that you could never have in a classroom. We say we bring history to life and I believe we really do that. You can see oxen working or look at a bed to understand how and where a kid slept more than 100 years ago, or how laundry got done.

And you can keep coming back, year after year or month after month, because every day could be a different experience. In fact we are offering more interpreted talks and guided tours with staff members, so you can see what you haven’t seen before or  find a new way to look at it. Kids today are complaining about mowing the lawn, kids in the past had to keep the farm working.  They also had to make hundreds of candles every fall and spring.

Are there other programming plans you can share with us?

We use our village for interpretation and we can add more experiences, since we focus on the 19th century, which was such a rich time period. We plan to add more programs related to women’s suffrage as well as slavery and abolition.  These subjects are so ripe for historical experiences and we are always working to do more to tell these stories and give people hands-on fun experience.

Was GCVM a focal point of your life while you were growing up?

We came here all the time, every summer of my life, anytime anything significant was going on. It was important for us to be here as a family, to see how the attendance was and if the visitors were having a good time. And it’s funny because now my kids ask me these same questions: “Was it a good weekend?” “Did a lot of people come out.” It’s now come full circle.