Kathe Hambrick is an independent consultant, curator, public historian, author, and public speaker. In April of 2021, she founded a consultant agency, 2PRESERVE LLC. In addition to exhibit design, she provides guidance in program development, museum governance, and interpretative planning. The preservation of historic buildings and slavery era burial grounds is her passion. Hambrick is considered an expert on sugar plantation history in Louisiana and has been interviewed by local, national, and international media. She is experienced in community relations and is a liaison to corporations, museums, governmental agencies, community leaders, and faith-based organizations.
Hambrick is the Founder and former Executive Director of the River Road African American Museum and is a past president of the Association of African American Museums. She served as the Chief Curator and Director of Interpretation for the West Baton Rouge Museum. Throughout her 30-year career, she has curated over 100 exhibits, including The Rural Roots of Jazz and Rural Black Doctors. Her latest projects involve the curation of a permanent exhibit about the GU272 enslaved people sold by the Jesuits of Georgetown to an Episcopal sugar planter in Ascension Parish, Louisiana.
Kathe Hambrick is the author and co-author of several books: Juke Joint Men, Oh Say Can You See: Flag Paintings of Malaika Favorite, Our Roots Run Deep, and Freedoms’ Journey: Understanding the Underground Railroad in South Louisiana. Hambrick teaches Introduction to Museology at Southern University in New Orleans where she received a master’s degree in Museums Studies in 2012.