Susan Hamley, Executive Director of Chester County Tourism, spoke with BUCKSO Today about growing up on the North Side of Chicago, cheering for the Cubs, attending Catholic school, and learning leadership as the oldest sibling in an Irish family.

After attending Northern Illinois University, Hamley created roles for herself within Citicorp Diners Club and the Colorado mountain industry before rising to lead Chester County’s tourism bureau.

Today, she uses her talent for unconventional thinking to support one of the state’s biggest industries and raise awareness of local attractions and other reasons to visit.

Where were you born, and where did you grow up, Susan?

I was born in Chicago, and we moved to a first-ring suburb of Chicago called Park Ridge when I was five. My parents are still there, so I still get to sleep in my old bedroom when I’m home. It’s on the North Side, so I’m a Cubs fan versus White Sox — important distinction!

What did your mom and dad do?

Mom stayed home and took care of six kids. Five girls, one boy. We had one of the smaller Irish Catholic families.

My Dad worked in industrial engineering. When we were young, he would often have to go to the plant, whether it was in Puerto Rico or Ohio or somewhere else, and he would leave on a Sunday and come back on Friday. So, if you got in trouble, you do it on Monday or Tuesday, so Mom would forget by Friday.

Where were you in the pecking order?

I’m the oldest. There’s a 12-year difference between me and my sister, Peggy. When you’re older, it’s always, “Look after your brother and sisters. Keep an eye on the kids. You’re older, you know better.” So, you assume that role. I was the boss. But I loved it. Family is everything to me.

We celebrated birthdays and holidays and graduations and everything. We went on driving vacations in our old Griswold-like woody station wagon.

We had to have dinner together at the same time, every single night. We had a tiny kitchen, but we all sat around that table. We had one bathroom to start, before we added another little one upstairs. It was tough when five of you were female, but we survived. These are the simple, heartfelt things you remember.

Did you play any sports in high school?

I’m not overly athletic. I played your typical teenage sports — softball and volleyball — just for fun.

What did you do in high school to distinguish yourself?

I went to an all-girls Catholic high school. Sometimes it was like The Trouble with Angels. If there was organizing to be done, I took it on with my friend Judy. If there was a revue show or some type of event, we always got involved. Our most memorable role was The Park Ridge Family, performing with our other Park Ridge bus route classmates in the city.

Did you have any jobs when you were growing up?

I did. We had made-up jobs when we were kids, like lemonade stands, but we took it to the next level. My friend Linda and I put the stand in the little red wagon and took it around to local parks.

My first real job, when I was 16, was at Pier 1 Imports. They were opening up a store in an old retail space by us, and they needed 60 kids to build shelves, unbox merchandise, and put it on the shelves. Everything had to get ready for the store to open. As progress was made, I’m proud to say that the group of 60 was culled to about 24, then 12, then six, and I was one of the six at the end. Then they made me a junior manager, so I got a nickel more an hour.

The manager told me why. He had a hidden window up top, and every time he looked, I was doing the job. So, the lesson for me was to perform as if no one is watching. Do it because it makes a difference to the overall goal.

My Dad used to say, “If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.” It’s a sense of fulfillment for me.

What about music? You can’t grow up when we grew up and not have had music play a role in your life.

Music feeds my soul. It can be nostalgic. It can bring you up if you’re down.

For me, it’s rock and roll. There’ll always be some Stones and Moody Blues and The Who in my life, but also bluegrass, jazz, reggae, classical, whatever. My relatives were all Irish, so we had a lot of Irish music at family parties, and bagpipers were part of traditional events.

There’s a group called The Clancy Brothers, and they play with Tommy Makem. They’re Irish legends. I can sing you “Molly Malone,” “Danny Boy,” “The Unicorn” — that was all part of my childhood.

Did you go to any concerts?

A lot of concerts. Elton John is one variety. Prince is another, and he was the headliner at a music festival we organized outdoors in the Warehouse District of Minneapolis in 1999! They’re all so different, and they’re at different times in your life.

In Atlantic City, they have older groups play for reasonable prices in intimate settings. It’s great. We’ve seen Dennis DeYoung and Journey, and Kenny Loggins. I think Blues Travelers and Gin Blossoms are next.

Where did you end up going to college? And why there?

I went to Northern Illinois University. It’s in corn country, DeKalb, Ill. It was an easy hour-and-a-half drive from my house, but I lived on campus, so it was a valuable adulting experience.

In our second year, a group of us hosted a pre-Thanksgiving Day feast, the way only college kids can do it. I can’t imagine how terrible it was, but it became a tradition, every single year. It was 10, 15 years we did it, and then it got smaller, but we still do it from time to time, even though we live in different states.

One song that we loved was “Mack the Knife.” We have an actual carving knife that we inscribed with Mack the Knife. One of my friends is a surgeon now, so he has to carve the turkey with it.

What did you major in?

General business.

Looking back, was Northern Illinois University a good choice for you?

I think it was. I wasn’t Harvard material. I liked the proximity to home, and the people I got to know there weren’t from too far away, which is why we could stay friends after school, even though every one of us was headed in a different professional direction.

Looking back over your career, who were the people who saw promise in you and opened up doors?

I lucked into some situations where there wasn’t a position existing. I’d find things that weren’t being done and do them, and before I knew it, I’d created a role for myself. That’s happened several times.

When I was working for Citicorp Diners Club, we found that high-caliber golf tournaments are great for relationship building. We sponsored a new Diners Club Matches PGA, LPGA, and Senior PGA event with Jack Nicklaus Productions. It was a team match played and televised on ESPN and ABC. The IBM CFO was there, and that helped us win a bigger share of their business.

I wanted to prove that I could handle the standard of hospitality for these people and their spouses, so I asked my boss, Chuck Wardell, “Can I take this on?” He said, “I don’t know. This is really high-level. You’re already doing the marketing.” I said, “Can I prove it to you?” And he trusted me. I did it, and it was such a huge success that the CEO of Diners Club International promoted me to Vice President. So, any nationally televised events for the company came to me.

There was another boss I had at Diners Club, Jerry Smith. I was trying to figure out a way to save some money and become more productive, and he told me, “Think outside the box.” I know that’s a cliché, but I’d never heard it before.

I thought about it, literally taking off the sides of a box, and I was able to create a plan. We closed or downsized all the offices across the country and put everybody in their homes. This was remote work before we knew what that was. It was the ‘90s. The main computer was in a room all by itself that was freezing cold. Most people didn’t know how to work a laptop. We didn’t even have internet; we had intranet. So, we implemented a whole training program.

Even if my ideas are crazy, I try not to let that box limit my thinking, and Jerry encouraged that. It was eye-opening.

How did you get to Chester County?

I was working for Snowmass Tourism in Colorado, which is next to Aspen, part of the Aspen Snowmass brand. It’s quaint and wonderful, with less than 2,000 people in the population, but come ski season, there are 10,000 people all over the place.

But after 10 years working in a ski resort without being an avid skier, I decided to take time to travel and then look for other jobs. This one, leading Chester County’s Tourism, resonated with me. There was a virtual interview first, and when I made the cut and was invited for an in-person interview, I came a day early to check out Longwood Gardens, and I went, “This is off the charts. This is something I can be so proud to promote.”

What was it that impressed you about Chester County on that first trip?

It was the winding roads and the implication of what it’s going to look like when everything is green in the summer. And it was the friendliness of the people. Chicago is a very friendly city. Everyone looks out for each other. I felt that here. Sometimes, when you’re from the Midwest, you get the impression of Easterners as arrogant, and there’s none of that stereotype here. Everybody was so gracious. I felt I belonged here, and I’m still here.

What are you focused on right now? What opportunities? What challenges?

We just moved our offices into the historic Chester County Courthouse and created the new Welcome Center, which is designed to welcome visitors and locals alike.

A lot of locals don’t realize how much we have here. Most people know about Longwood, but do they know about the Wharton Esherick Museum? Do they know about the Wyeths and the Brandywine Museum of Art? Do they know about the Mill at Anselma? There are so many assets here and a lot of history. We want the locals to know that.

We’re doing a focus on the mushroom industry in September. And talking to Conor Hepp about a mini display for the Chester County History Center. The point is to support the local nonprofits by creating these aha moments, where people realize, “I didn’t know we had this here. I’m going to go visit their establishment. I’m going to learn more. I’m going to buy their goods, their food.” They then become ambassadors and spread the word.

Tourism is the second largest industry in the county, isn’t it? Behind agriculture?

That’s what’s said, not just in the county but in the state. Nobody has ever shown me full stats to prove it, but I think so. Tourism generated $1.5 billion in economic impact in 2023. And just not known to most people, tourism saves residents on average $830/year in taxes.

When you think of tourism jobs, you think of hotel staff. But go beyond that. When there’s an event, you’ve got rental companies that get business. You’ve got the florists, photographers, and landscapers. There are the brewers who make the beers and the farmers who grow the food that ends up on the table.

Can somebody just walk in off the street, or do they need to make an appointment?

Walk in off the street, Monday through Saturday from 10:00 AM-4:00 PM, and Sundays from 12-4:00 PM. It’s a Welcome Center. And we are very welcoming!

What else are you focused on?

Well, next year, 2026, is explosive. There’s America250. That’s mostly local, people celebrating the pride of where they live and the abundant local heritage.

But there’s also the FIFA World Cup. Half a million people are coming to the Philly area, and 70 percent of them won’t have a ticket to the games. We want to make sure that they make their way to Chester County, have an amazing experience, and come back again. It’s a launching pad, not a landing pad.

Year-round, we have a brilliant Marketing team, and they do robust advertising in New York, New Jersey, D.C, Baltimore, Northern Virginia, Pittsburgh, and Boston.

Chances are, if your kids are into sports, they’re traveling around to tournaments. Most of the lacrosse and soccer and hockey and other tournaments started with us. Meetings, events, international visitors — we directly and indirectly influence all of it.

Those are things that most people don’t know the tourism bureau does. Visitors don’t just wake up and say, “I think I’ll go to Chester County.” You have to invite them.

What new initiative are you most excited about right now?

For 2026, we’ve landed an amazing producer to do a major music and arts festival. That, to me, will be very exciting, and for sponsors who step up to support the unprecedented philanthropic angle to it.

People think that festivals are just for the week they occur, but they’re not. A friend of mine brought Citadel Country Spirit USA to Chester County in 2018, and when that happened, Brad Paisley and Toby Keith, and others playing at the festival were talking about it with their followers for months leading up to it.

So, whether or not you come to an event like that, you keep hearing Chester County, Chester County, and you get these warm and fuzzies.

What do you do with all your free time?

I’m not an artisan, but I enjoy stained glass work. We’ve finished our basement, so I can have my own little artist studio down there. Also, pickleball. I’m that age where pickleball just makes sense. It’s easier than tennis. And traveling — I love traveling.

What’s the best place you’ve been to?

Every place is so different and unique. I would say my most memorable trip was when I was 22, my girlfriend Gail was 21, and we backpacked around Europe for three months.

I have family in Ireland and England, so we started there. You use a Eurail pass to explore new countries, starting off in English, but then you go to France, and you have a new language, a new currency. You walk through the middle of Barcelona, and there are the locals doing a dance in their colorful costumes. We went to 13 countries in all, and it’s memorable because all the places were so different — all the people, the experiences, the surprises.

What keeps you hopeful and optimistic? It’s a crazy world out there.

Believing that the next great thing is around the corner.

Also, my rock star husband, Doug. We moved for my job from Chicago to Minneapolis to Aspen/Snowmass to here. Not every husband would do that, but he viewed it the way I do, as a new adventure. That continues to make me feel very supported.

Finally, Susan, what’s the best advice you’ve ever received?

It’s still Jerry Smith saying, “Think outside the box.”

Don’t just wish something were different. Change your paradigm. Change the way you see it, the way you think about it, the way you approach and do it. It’s okay, even when others may think it isn’t.