Meet the Team: Natalie Milor
My name is Natalie Milor and I am the Curator of the David Livingstone Trust. My role is centred around working on the redesign of the new museum with our designers Event Communications.
Since starting with the Trust in October 2017, I have worked with the wider team to develop the floorplan for the museum, identify key themes and select objects for display.
In the past year I have been focusing on working with our amazingly knowledgeable volunteers, staff and trainees to research and write the interpretation text for the museum. We have been very lucky to benefit from the advice and support of the members of our Expert Advisory Panel - academics, museum professionals and researchers from across the world - as well as local historians to ensure the interpretation reflects the most up-to-date research on Livingstone, his travels and his companions.
Livingstone was an avid writer and I find reading his letters and journals one of the most fascinating parts of working at the Trust. Wherever possible I tried to include Livingstone’s own words through quotes in the interpretation so people can get a flavour of him as a person. He was passionate about his mission but also had a wry sense of humour and found beauty in the small things (like the activities of ants!).
Between his own writings and many biographies, there is much information about Livingstone. In contrast, there is relatively little information known about the people who supported him including his Southern African guides, translators and porters. Much of my time is spent trying to fill in this missing information so we can show Livingstone not as a lone figure but as someone who succeeded by working in collaboration with the local people he met, his family and his paid crew.
