Born in Newark, Stephen Crane was the youngest son of Jonathan Townley Crane, D.D., former principal of Pennington Seminary. At thirteen, Crane followed in his father’s footsteps, attending the Seminary, where he laid the groundwork for his future as a writer. A literary giant of the 19th century, Crane influenced Hemingway, Conrad, and Cather. He authored The Red Badge of Courage, a classic Civil War novel, and “The Open Boat,” a landmark of literary Naturalism. A prolific writer and journalist, Crane covered wars in Cuba and Greece, published stories across the West, and worked for major New York City newspapers.

In this talk, The Hopewell Museum trustee Eric Lubell will present a multimedia portrait of Crane’s life and work, exploring his genius, controversies, and enduring influence on American literature.

This program is co-sponsored by the Hopewell Valley Historical Society, The Hopewell Museum, and the Pennington Public Library.

About the Speaker: Eric Lubell, a Hopewell resident and board trustee of The Hopewell Museum, spent over 40 years as a writer and creative director in the audio-visual industry. His work is showcased in museums worldwide, including the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute, the Malaysia National Science Centre, the Kaohsiung National Science and Technology Museum, the American Museum of Natural History, the ProRodeo Hall of Fame, and Kennedy Space Center’s SpacePort USA. For a decade, he penned the American Society of Magazine Editors’ National Magazine Awards and Glamour Magazine‘s Women of the Year Awards. Lubell also founded and served as Editor-in-Chief of The Independent: A Journal for Princeton, where he published essays, criticism, and fiction by Princeton alumni for the university community.

Established in 1922, The Hopewell Museum preserves and protects many objects that tell the story of the Hopewell Valley and its residents. To continue the museum's mission, The Hopewell Museum retained preventive conservator Wendy Jessup to plan and implement the recovery of the museum’s vast garment and textile collection.  On April 29th, Jessup will present an illustrated lecture about the project and the importance of community involvement in the stewardship of shared resources.

Wendy Jessup celebrated her fiftieth year as a museum professional in 2024. She began her career at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, followed by several years at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and in 1983, she joined the administration of the newly completed Museum Support Center (MSC) of the Smithsonian and was involved in all aspects of operation of a complex collections storage and research facility, including pest management and environmental monitoring and management. During her tenure at the MSC, Wendy developed one of the first IPM programs for a museum facility. Since establishing her private practice in 1989 to provide preventive conservation services, she has consulted to a large number of museums, archives, and historic sites within the United States and internationally. A Fellow of the International Institute for Conservation and Professional Member of the American Institute for Conservation, Wendy is highly experienced in identifying vulnerabilities and risks to collections and in setting objectives for risk reduction, collections accountability, and preventive conservation. She served on the course development and instruction teams for the Getty Conservation Institute’s Preventive Conservation, Museum Collections and their Environments (1989-1994) and Preserving Collections in the Age of Sustainability (2016-2018), part of the GCI’s Managing Collections Environment initiative.  Much of her recent practice focuses on collaborative development of facilities for long-term preservation of cultural heritage resources, balancing the needs of collections, the buildings in which they are housed, and the stewards who care for and use them.

This program is co-sponsored by the Hopewell Valley Historical Society, The Hopewell Museum, and the Hopewell Branch of the Mercer County Library. 

This event will be in-person and accessible via Zoom.

Best,
Asher