In her role as director of education at the Battleship New Jersey Museum and Memorial in Camden, New Jersey, US, Libby Jones is responsible for the experience of thousands of school children, families, and tourists on board the most decorated battleship in American history. Her work to bring historic ships to everyone has been recognised by the Historic Naval Ships Association and the Navy’s History and Heritage Command. She has worked at museums for the past ten years, in the fields of social media and education, including at Historic Ships in Baltimore, George Washington’s Mount Vernon, KID Museum and the DC Arts Center. She holds a bachelor’s degree in American History from San Francisco State University.
Jones is the creator of the Battleship New Jersey’s YouTube channel, which grew rapidly during the pandemic to nearly 1200 individual episodes. The museum’s collection of artefacts, the ship’s history, and its restoration are all covered in the channel’s material, which has received over 60 million views. In addition to the battleship, Jones has utilised the channel to inform and promote dozens of other museums across the nation, including those in Massachusetts, Florida, and Hawaii. That effort has brought visitors, donations, and volunteers to those museums.
The channel has most recently been used to generate money for the ship’s impending drydock. Donations flooded in from every state in the country as well as several foreign nations within a day of the announcement on the channel. On the first day, more money was raised than during the whole previous month’s total donations. As a small museum, only 50,000 people visit Battleship New Jersey each year. More individuals than ever before have been able to learn about the museum thanks to the channel, especially those visitors who otherwise wouldn’t be able to visit in person because of accessibility or distance issues.