Visitors Prefer First–Person Accounts
by USS Constitution Museum Team
The audience research we conducted focused on how to present personal narratives in engaging ways to foster personal connection between visitors and stories.
We tested different types of interpretive labels with visitors and learned that 64% of visitors preferred labels written in the first person as opposed to a third person curatorial voice. Visitors preferred the conversational voice because it “felt like the historical cut-out is speaking directly to them.”
Here is an example of the life-size cutout with first person label
When asked about the first person approach, one visitor to our prototype exhibit commented:
“…When I come to a history museum I want my family to hear it from the people who lived it, not a secondhand dry account. History should be alive and this type of label gives you a chance to be a part of that.”
Another added:
“As a history buff, it matters to know what the actual people felt and thought about the lives they were living. For kids this is extra important since children learn more when they are part of the story.”
Leaving Home to Start a New Life
I will soon see if the sailor’s life is for me. No doubt I will miss my family and friends and all of the comforts of home but I am excited (and a little scared) about what my new life will be like.
“My parting was very much the same as that of all other boys of twelve, when they leave home for the first time – a mixture of hopes and fears, of tears and smiles, of sunshine and cloud.”
—Samuel Leech, 1810
Grab a Plate and Join Our Mess
Mealtime is my favorite time of the day. The sailors I eat with (called a mess) are my family. We drink, laugh and tell stories too! My messmates make the hard life of a sailor a little more pleasant. Our bond is strong and we always look out for each other.
“The crew of a man of war is divided into little communities of about 8, called ‘messes.’ These eat and drink together, and are, as it were, so many families.”
—Samuel Leech, 1810
