Volume 13, Number 7
Nov 1989

Executive Director/President of CCAHA Resigns

Robert J. Strauss, Executive Director/President of the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts (CCAHA) announced that he would be leaving his position as of March 30, 1990.

"The past two years have been extremely rewarding," Strauss said. "I came to the Conservation Center believing that regional conservation centers were a very important component of the effort to save our nation's cultural patrimony. I am now more convinced than ever of the vitality and effectiveness of centers such as ours."

During Mr. Strauss's tenure the Conservation Center continued to offer the high quality conservation treatment it has been known for. The Center also embarked on two major survey initiatives. First, a two-year project to assess the needs of archival repositories in the Commonwealth of Virginia; the other, a three-year project funded by the William Penn Foundation to assess the needs of approximately sixty small to mid-sized institutions in the Philadelphia area.

Frank H. Goodyear, Jr., Chairman of the Conservation Center, commented on Strauss' s resignation, "Bob Strauss has strengthened the Conservation Center during the past two years, by attracting a talented staff of conservators, and securing important treatment contracts from museums, libraries, and state archives. Bob's vision of the role of a regional center has placed the Conservation Center as a leader in the field of regional conservation."

The Staff of the Center, as well as the Board of Directors, are all extremely talented, and dedicated to the mission and goals of the Conservation Center," Strauss noted. "This seems like an appropriate time for me to pursue personal interests that have been relegated to a secondary position in my life."

A national search to replace Bob Strauss will be conducted by Trustees Ellen S. Dunlap, Director of the Rosenbach Museum and Library, and Dr. Roger W. Moss, Jr., Executive Director of the Athenaeum of Philadelphia.