Williams is operations manager at the Stabler-Leadbeater Apothecary Museum in Alexandria. She also is assistant director of its sister museum, Gatbsy’s Tavern. Starting Nov. 21, the Apothecary Museum will offer a new Behind the Counter tour. For information, go to http://oha.alexandriava.gov/apothecary.
What role did you play in setting up this new tour?
The museum staff and I helped craft this behind-the-scenes opportunity because there’s a lot of things we don’t get to cover on our regular half-hour tour, so this is an opportunity for folks to dig deep and see a lot of [the museum’s collection].
What kind of things will visitors see on the tour?
We’re pulling out different objects such as labels and different apothecary bottles.
More specifically, why the Apothecary Museum?
It’s an amazing time capsule of one family business. I think … the coolest part of it is [seeing] the evolution of a business starting in 1792 to when it closed 1933. When it closed, the family locked the doors and left everything; you can go up to our second-floor manufacturing room and open a drawer and see the original herbs the family used to make medicines.
What drew you to working in museums?
I love history and the stories that it tells. I think you learn a lot in how things happened in the 18th to 19th century and how we can apply it to [what’s going on today]. I was a historic preservation major in college and I got my master’s in heritage tourism.
What kind of preservation work have you done at the Apothecary Museum?
Preservation is a large umbrella; it [includes] collections preservation and building preservation. The first two projects we took on when the city got the museum … were restoring these glass advertisements and … the busts of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin that were in really rough shape.
– Violeta Ikonomova
