PARIS — McLaughlin Garden and Homestead has hired a former New York museum director to run the nonprofit’s historic farmstead.

Barbara Durr, president of the McLaughlin Foundation, announced that Donna Anderson was appointed executive director for the South Paris-based group. She will move to Maine and start in January.  

Anderson has spent nearly 24 years in upstate New York, working for museums, historic sites, libraries, science centers and cultural heritage organizations. She has also organized sharing collections to display exhibitions of history, art, science and natural history sites, Durr said. 

For the past seven years, she was also the coordinator of the Yager Museum of Art and Culture at Hartwick College, a teaching museum with multidisciplinary collections in Oneonta, N.Y., she said.

“Through these positions, she has worked to connect audiences with art and artifacts, making the exploration of history and culture accessible and engaging for diverse community members,” Durr said in a news release. 

“I am delighted and honored to join the McLaughlin Foundation team and to help the organization continue its strong commitment to preservation and conservation in a beautiful environment in Maine,” Anderson said. 

Anderson will take over management of the 1840s farmstead of Bernard McLaughlin at 103 Main St., a historic building listed on the National Register of Historic Preservation. 

The foundation has gone without an executive director for nearly two years following the departure of Ruth Copeman, Durr said. The move will enable the McLaughlin Foundation to expand its programming to the historic Curtis House next door, which it purchased last fall, and begin a new strategic planning for the site. 

“We’re necessarily going in the museum direction — the garden and our historic property are our mainstays,” Durr said. 

Anderson holds a master’s degree in museum studies from the University of Toronto. She has expertise in organizational management, strategic planning and interpretation through both exhibitions and educational programs. 

“I look forward to working with the director of horticulture, Kristin Perry, in her creative work in the landscape and to expand the programming related to historic preservation in new and exciting ways,” she said. 

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