Alumnae

Alumnae Museum

"It is through the past that we come to know the future."

Our Mission

The purpose/mission of the Cedar Crest Alumnae Museum is to preserve the history of Cedar Crest College and to develop/foster an appreciation of the history of women.

Goals and Objectives

1. Collect and preserve memorabilia and other items in forming the collection.
2. Showcase the collection through rotating exhibitions.
3. Provide opportunities for student internships.
4. Promote an appreciation of the history of women through exhibits of women's fashion and other items.

Museum History "The Cedar Crest Alumnae Museum opened its doors for the first time for a Reunion in May of 1992 in conjunction with the College's 125th anniversary.

Through the years, Priscilla Gelach Rosendale '52, Althea Mantz '45, and I nurtured a dream for a permanent place to keep our 'treasures' from the past. This all came true when the Alumnae were given storage and display space in Curtis Hall. Later, this space would expand during the summer of 1996.

My second goal for the museum was to provide a paid internship program available initially for Juniors and Seniors, but more recently, to Sophomores as well. Interns are given opportunities to plan exhibits using fashions and memorabilia collected since 1867. Students who wish to stay with the Museum after their internship may become paid Museum Associates. We also provide a Museum Work Study program to other students who are interested in working to preserve this part of Cedar Crest College's past."
Marcia Root Walsh,
Class of 1951
Alumnae Museum Founder


" The Alumnae Museum is a time machine. It lets us travel back to opening night of a Greek play fifty years ago or graduation in 1890 or the wedding of one of our alumnae. Through the imagination and support of Marcia Walsh and other dear friends of the College, the clothes and other treasures of past days come alive and let us relive those sweet earlier times at Cedar Crest."
Dr. Dorothy Gulbenkian Blaney,
President of Cedar Crest College (1989-2006)


" When women's colleges were first started people had the idea that a college girl was quite out of the ordinary. She was advanced. She was supposed to be not only studying the classics, but to be striving for a better, saner mode of life; a more rational style of dress; in short, to be an example to the community. Well, she was. For a few years we had a number of awkward, corsetless females, with hair 'slicked' back tight, flat-heeled boots, unfitted gowns, and possibly spectacles, who stood for the type of a college girl, and who were not one whit better psychically than their trimly corseted sisters."
Mary Billings Eddy in Good Housekeeping, 1907

Curtis Hall
Cedar Crest College
100 College Drive
Allentown, Pennsylvania 18104
Telephone: (610) 606-4609 Extension 3304

Toll-free: (888) 902-3327

Fax: (610) 740-3764
Hours: Monday-Friday 8:30 am-4:30 pm
Special Tours by Appointment.