Two years after the initial site visit to the Cambridge American Cemetery Visitor Center, the team’s vision for a new exhibit space is coming to life. The American Battle Monuments Commission’s Visitor Services and Interpretation staff along with Historical Services created the new space with input from on-site staff and vendor design and fabrication services.  

The Visitor Center will close to guests Sept. 13 and reopen this fall with new thematic displays that take visitors through the journey of service members arriving in Cambridge during World War II, which was experienced by many of those buried and memorialized at the cemetery.  

“I can’t wait to see it on site,” said Domitille Arnaud, VSI project coordinator. “These projects take a very long time and it’s always very exciting to see it come to life. So, I cannot wait. I’m very excited.” 

Arnaud, along with the Historical Services team including Charlotte Meunier, museum curator; Ben Brands, historian, and Mike Knapp, chief of Historical Services, visited the exhibit fabrication vendor Aug. 26 in Manassas, Virginia, to do a final review of the exhibit before it is shipped to Cambridge to be installed in September.  

One highlight of the new exhibit, requested by the Cambridge American Cemetery team, is more information geared toward children. The newly renovated space will be the first ABMC visitor center to include activities specifically for children, which will be dispersed throughout the exhibits. 

Refreshing visitor center content is something ABMC aims to do in its visitors centers every 10 years. The VSI team collects data on who is visiting to tailor content toward their audience, as well as incorporating multiple learning styles to engage visitors. It’s also important to change the content format, Arnaud said. For instance, visitors today look for quick facts and most people don’t read long, text-heavy panels.  

The goal is to continue to share the stories of service members buried and memorialized at Cambridge American Cemetery, as well as raise questions so people can reflect on the past and think about what is going on in the present, Arnaud said.  

Cambridge American Cemetery is one of two U.S. military cemeteries in the U.K. but the only World War II site. It is located on the outskirts of the university city of Cambridge. It was a temporary cemetery during the war and commonly described as the “aviator’s cemetery” or the “Eighth Air Force Cemetery,” due to the many surrounding airfields. It contains the graves of approximately 4,000 U.S. service members. In addition, more than 5,100 names are also inscribed on its walls of the missing.