Joel Bartsch: Pompeii, Rome - Revisiting a Lost City

Tuesday, March 23, 2021

Pompeii, Rome - Revisiting a Lost City

Joel A. Bartsch, a historian from Houston, Texas, serves as the president and CEO of the Houston Museum of Natural Science (HMNS). In these roles, Joel Bartsch has increased the museum’s revenue by attracting high-interest exhibits and events.

In February 2021, for example, HMNS launched POMPEII: The Exhibition, featuring artifacts from the ancient Roman city. In the fall of AD 79, Pompeii disappeared under lava and ash in only two days when Mount Vesuvius erupted.

Approximately 1,700 years later, workmen unearthed the ruins of Pompeii, exposing the story of the forgotten city. The HMNS exhibition reveals that Pompeii was a modern city that contained a thriving center with food stands, fine art, and graffiti signifying the city’s events.

The exhibit includes 150 artifacts on loan from Naples National Archaeological Museum in Italy. The artifacts include mosaics, frescoes, gladiator helmets, armor, weapons, lamps, pots, pans, and a ship’s anchor. Visitors can also see eight body casts of people from the site.

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About Joel Bartsch

Since 2004, Joel A. Bartsch has led the Houston Museum of Natural Science (HMNS) as president and CEO. In this capacity, he coordinates and leads museum staff and curators in the creation and maintenance of immersive exhibits, implements renovation strategies, and promoting museum-wide leadership. Through these efforts and many others, Joel A. Bartsch has nearly doubled both the institution’s annual attendance and membership base. He also oversaw two major expansions at the museum that added more than 250,000 square feet of space.

Mr. Bartsch began gaining experience in museum leadership more than three decades ago, when he joined the Colorado School of Mines Geology Museum as a curatorial assistant and assistant to the director. He held this role during his last years as a mining engineering student at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden. From there, Mr. Bartsch took on staff roles at the Texas Memorial Museum and HMNS, curator of earth sciences at Lyman House Memorial Museum in Hawaii, and director and curator of the California State Mining & Mineral Museum.

Through these positions, Joel Bartsch gained extensive experience in everything from managing daily operations and directing fundraising efforts to writing corporate grant requests. He drew on this experience when he returned to HMNS as a curator, project manager, and director of earth sciences, the positions he held immediately prior to his current role as the president and CEO.