News Release

Homewood House Museum, a National Historic Landmark and the Federal era home of Charles Carroll Jr. located on the Homewood campus of the Johns Hopkins University, seeks volunteers to be trained as museum guides.

Docent training classes will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturdays, Sept. 9, 16, 23, and 30. Volunteers who complete guide training will be expected to commit to a minimum of one three-hour shift a month. To reserve a space or for additional information, contact Judith Proffitt at Homewood House at (410) 516-5589. For information about the museum, visit on-line at www.jhu.edu/historichouses.

Prospective docents should have an interest in architecture, art or history and a desire to share that interest with others. Homewood's docents present Homewood as a Federal country house reflecting the architecture, ideals and culture of the new nation, and interpret the early 19th-century lifestyle of a prominent Maryland family to visitors. Training, provided by museum staff, includes lectures and readings on the history of Baltimore in the Federal era, the Carroll family, and Federal style architecture and decorative arts. New guides will also learn about museum practices and will be taught techniques for presenting Homewood House in ways that satisfy visitor expectations.

Volunteers of Homewood House Museum, one of the Historic Houses of Johns Hopkins, join the intellectual life of The Johns Hopkins University, a fascinating community of art and architecture lovers, history scholars, educators, and museum supporters. They are invited to participate in special social events, openings, lectures, and monthly trips to historic sites and exhibitions. The 2006-2007 travel schedule includes tours of historic houses in Annapolis (September), a trip to Gracie Mansion in New York City (October), and visits to Pittsburgh to see Louis Comfort Tiffany: Artist for the Ages at the Carnegie Museum of Art (November), and to Philadelphia to see Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs at the Franklin Institute (March). Museum volunteers also receive a 10 percent discount at the Homewood House and Evergreen House museum shops, are included on the Homewood and Evergreen mailing lists to receive exhibition and program publicity, as well as each museum's newsletter, and are eligible for the staff membership rate at the O'Connor Recreation Center and partial borrowing privileges at the Sheridan Libraries.