NATCHEZ — While many may fear change to traditions 80 years in the making, historic house owners and involved citizens packed the theater at the Natchez Visitor Reception Center Tuesday evening to discuss revamping historic house tours and Natchez tourism.

Through a $23,000 grant through the Mississippi Delta Region Initiative, the Natchez National Historical Park hired consultant Mary Ruffin Hanbury to assess the current situation of Spring Pilgrimage and offer suggestions for bringing fresh ideas to historic traditions.

“I don’t want to come in and seem like the expert that’s coming into town and cramming things down peoples’ throats,” Hanbury said. “I want to bring a menu of things and allow them to pick and choose what, if anything, they want to change.”

Tuesday’s informal meeting marked a kick-off phase to get a feel for what people who are involved in Natchez tourism felt could use change, Hanbury said.

Following the kick-off phase, Hanbury said she will continue with a three-pronged research plan, which includes gathering data, interviewing homeowners and compiling results from Internet-based surveys.

The three topics Hanbury said her research will focus on is interpretation, preservation and visitor experience.

Hanbury will seek to study how historical stories are interpreted and how landmarks are preserved. She will also talk to visitors about everything from signs and parking to the tours themselves.

“With all these things we need to think about strengths and weakness of each one,” Hanbury said. “What should we keep and make sure we don’t mess up and what are the things that could use some help moving forward?”

After gathering all the information, Hanbury said she will compile a report for the Natchez tour house community of the best practices and recommendations of things that could change.

Ideas offered during Tuesday’s meeting included a greater focus on living tours featuring actors in full dress offering travel information and history lessons to ensuring several websites keep up to date information regarding the Pilgrimage.

“What I see in Natchez is a great appreciation for what people have done to build (Pilgrimage) with great reverence, but also with room for growth and change,” Hanbury said. “Not many clients are like that. It’s a nice middle of the road here.”

Hanbury has previously worked as a historic consultant in Natchez. Her past work includes doing a tourism assessment for the sites noted as African-American tourism sites.