Vice President: Elizabeth Pickard
Elizabeth Pickard is the Director of Interpretive Programs at the Missouri History Museum Elizabeth supervises Interpretive Programs at the Missouri History Museum including K-12 Education, Youth and Family, Teen and Adult and Theatre programs. She researches, writes, directs, produces and performs plays in the museum as well as presenting outside artists and handling the artistic direction of the Teens Make History Players. Teens Make History is an award-winning work based learning program for local teens that she founded in 2007 that has expanded to include both teens working on theater projects and exhibition content. Elizabeth began working full time in theater programs at the Missouri History Museum in 2007 after serving a two year Graduate Research Assistantship as part of her graduate work in Museum Studies at the University of Missouri St. Louis with Jay Rounds. During her assistantship, Elizabeth completed a survey of museums using theater and theatrical techniques in order to propose and implement theatrical programming at MHM.
Prior to coming to St. Louis, Elizabeth worked at Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth Massachusetts as a colonial interpreter. There she perfected skills in first and third person interpretation, open hearth cooking, rare breed cattle feeding, and being pregnant on the Mayflower II - followed by carrying your one year old like they did in the 17th Century. Before her work in museums, Elizabeth worked for the Association of Performing Arts Presenters in Washington, DC where she both learned a lot about association management and supported her acting habit. She has a degree in Dramatic Arts from St. Mary's College of Maryland. When she was in college, she would dress up as Eleanor of Aquitaine and perform for AP European history classes and spent two seasons as a "street character" for the Maryland Renaissance Festival.Elizabeth served as the Membership officer of the Board for IMTAL from 2008-2010 and chaired the 2010 conference in St. Louis. She has a patient husband, Kurt Thoroughman, and two incredible daughters, Phoebe and Lydia, who keep her on her toes.