Brucemore executive director Jim Kern resigns

CEDAR RAPIDS - Brucemore Executive Director Jim Kern has resigned, seeking time to pursue other interests.

“I've been talking about it off and on for the past year,” said Kern, 61, who has presided over the National Trust Historic Site since 2007. “I'm feeling very good about the decision. It's just time for me to slow things down a bit.”

The Brucemore Board of Trustees accepted Kern's resignation Wednesday. His last day will be Dec. 31.

“Jim's commitments to Brucemore, tireless work ethic, and professional skills have helped take Brucemore to a new level,” Tom Amosson, President of the Brucemore Board of Trustees said in a statement. “Although we will miss him dearly, the Board wishes him the best with his future plans.”

Those plans include leading travel tours - Kern has led tours to New York and elsewhere - and continuing on the city's Visual Arts Commission, which he currently chairs.

Kern's involvement at Brucemore is long and varied.

He catered the first event as a National Trust site in 1981; performed in Arsenic and Old Lace in the mansion in 1989; co-founded the Classics at Brucemore in 1996 and served as Artistic Director, Producer, or Executive Producer each year and joined the staff as Assistant Director in the spring of 2002 before being named Executive Director in the fall of 2007.

Kern and his partner, Mickey Sigler, had been renting a home on the grounds of Brucemore, the Garden House, 224 Crescent St. SE, but moved into a new home six weeks ago.

He is just the second executive director of Iowa's only National Trust Historic Site, a 26-acre estate at 2160 Linden Drive SE, succeeding Peggy Whitworth.

Kern said he is proud of the manner in which Brucemore weathered the recession without having to lay off any staff and of the response to the Floods of 2008.

“Moving Home,” an original theatrical event staged at Brucemore, raised $18,000 for flood relief.

“Brucemore's response with the cultural community was by instinct, not by design,” he said.

A national search for Kern's replacement will be conducted by the Board of Trustees. Qualified local candidates will be encouraged to apply.