PHOTO | HERBERT L. WHITE

Charlotte Museum of History President and CEO Terri White stands in front of a sign from Peeler’s Portrait Studio, part of an exhibit at the eastside culture institution.

Terri White grew up with history.

White, who became president and CEO of Charlotte Museum of History on July 4, was immersed by it growing up in the historically Black Hill District of Pittsburgh, Pa. She engaged it in development and operations roles at the Heinz History Center and Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh and the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., where she earned a bachelor’s degree at Howard University.

White, who is pursuing a graduate degree at UNC Charlotte, earned an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and master’s in arts management from George Mason University. She worked in corporate project management at Lowe’s, Ahold Delhaize and American Tire Distributors before landing the job at the Museum of History.

The Post interviewed White, who talked about making the transition to Charlotte’s cultural community, making history accessible and relevant to historically marginalized communities, and growing up in a community that embraced local Black history. Responses are edited for brevity and clarity.

• On growing up in Pittsburgh, Pa., and how it led to her appreciation for history:

TW: “I am from Pittsburgh – born and raised – and it’s one of those places where you’ve got to ask what high school people went to, because a lot of people from [Allegheny] County and the surrounding counties will say they’re from Pittsburgh, and they’re really not Pittsburgh. It’s like the equivalent of saying, ‘I’m from Charlotte,’ when they’re really from Greensboro.

“The neighborhood I’m from is the Hill District, which is the neighborhood made famous by [playwright] August Wilson. He and my father knew each other in real life – my parents were a little older. So, it’s a community that when you're a kid on the Hill, everyone drills into you that yes, the neighborhood is not as amazing as it used to be because it was not necessarily a golden palace when I was a child, but that history is drilled into you.

“The Pittsburgh Courier [a historic Black community newspaper] was founded in the Hill District. When you talk about Crawford Grill and all the jazz clubs and all the jazz musicians and singers and actresses that came from Pittsburgh, if they weren’t from the Hill, they stayed on the Hill at one point. You would have elders saying ‘Oh yeah, Lena Horne stayed here when she came,’ or, ‘this hotel had Billy Eckstine,’ or, such a such went to Schenley High School. It is just a natural part of life. And my mother in particular made sure that diaspora history was a major part of my life to the point where it's like, ‘Oh, my God, mom, OK, I get it. Black history, please. Anything else?’ So that was just my childhood, because of the people that I grew up around.”

• On making the transition from the Smithsonian to corporate life and back to the cultural space in Charlotte.

TW: “When I was in corporate America, even though I loved my teams and I loved the people I was engaging with, it was really hard to be the sparkling glitter in a room full of cardboard, no offense to my corporate friends. It just wasn’t a personality fit for me. And when I would close my laptop for the day, because I’m working from home for the last several years, I wasn’t excited to tell my friends what I did that day.

“Nobody wants to hear how I was able to turn my project from yellow to green. That’s not exciting. That’s not a brunch topic, but people are excited to hear ‘Oh, I saw this exhibit at your museum. What is that about? Or I saw this article in Harvard Business Review that talks about this.’ How does it apply to this thing that we’re doing at the museum or ‘hey guys, I have this program coming up you can tune into it live stream.’

“Those are more exciting stories, and it just reaches home for me better. I think it’s more valuable for the community to share these stories than ‘well, I cut my expenses by 5% last quarter.’”

• On the best part of an institution like Charlotte Museum of History, that’s tucked away in mostly residential east Charlotte as opposed to the cultural district in Center City.
TW: “It is a gift and a curse to be in east Charlotte. East Charlotte is a thriving, mostly residential community but we do have a lot of strong small businesses. On one hand, it is a struggle because we’re not in that main corridor. We’re not next door to the other museums or the performing arts theaters, so we don’t get that trickle-in traffic because people are walking around. But I think the blessing to being the jewel of the East in Charlotte, if you will, is that people who come here definitely want to be here. So that gives us an opportunity to create an experience for them that makes that journey worth it.

“I really think we’re doing an OK job of that and my vision [is to be] that destination where people go out of their way to say, ‘You know what, I’m visiting Charlotte but I here this museum is doing really innovative things. We’re not in Timbuktu, we're in the city, so we're accessible and plenty of free parking.”

• On making history and cultural institutions welcoming to audiences to wider audiences:

“When you hear people say, ‘Oh, I hate history class,’ or ‘I hate museums,’ I think what they’re saying is that they don’t see themselves in the stories that are told. How many dates can you memorize, [like] the battle of such a such happened … or whatever, and there is a time and place for that. I’m not dismissing those aspects of history, but I think what people forget is history is a constantly expanding and evolving thing. It’s not just battles and wars and government decisions.

“Everything we do has a history to it. One way that we demonstrate that currently is with our signs exhibit. Charlotte, as we know, is rapidly changing, and it’s changed just since I’ve moved here. What this gallery does is it has a collection of signs from small businesses and some not so small businesses that are unique to the area and don’t exist anymore. The signs, we pass them every day going about our daily lives. We don’t think about them until they’re not there. So, when you have arts barbecue, and then all of a sudden, the signs are not there. ‘Oh, wait a minute. We just lost that piece.’ We're trying very desperately to get Price’s Chicken Coop’s sign – those sorts of things that we take for granted. That is history that is a part of the culture and using the signs to tell how the city has evolved over time.”

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