Finding 14: 1978 Summer Internship Program

The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has a five decade history of providing college students with museum work experience. A student volunteer program, the precursor to the current internship program, was established in 1963 by the museum’s librarian, Mary Joan Hall. Requiring assistance in the day-to-day running of the library, she contacted Barnard College. In a January 28 letter, she wrote to the college’s placement office, “For an art history major the mere fact of being on the ‘inside’ of a museum should prove invaluable from the point of view of gaining experience as well as knowledge of the field.” The success of the first volunteer led the museum to implement a permanent program that grew in size and scale over the years. In 1968 sixteen summer volunteers overseen by an intern coordinator chosen from the previous year’s participants worked in nearly every museum department. Ten years later, the individuals pictured here attended a three-month internship program that included weekly educational seminars.

—Pete Asch, archives assistant