Funding pressures, digitisation requirements and staffing costs for having people available [staff or volunteers, who still need equipment and resources] to carry out research requests is likely to see more museums adding research costs to their ‘operating tariffs’.

Widening accessibility to archive material is a great aim, but it costs money to do it successfully.

Scanning formats should not be an issue for Accredited [or Registered] museums because there are ‘recognised industry standards’ for “digitisation”.

It might be easier to move the event to the barn, T.O.!! 😀

Certainly a lot less hassle for the barn owner – not sure about the visitor flows around the barn though!! 😮

…The contents of that barn would fill more than a few tables at Newark, and flatten a few others. Only had a brief peek this time but going back for more, with a big bag of swaps. There are couple of tractors in there that would spoil an agricultural enthusiast’s trousers as well.

Pity the barn owner didn’t come along to the November 09 Aeroboot then – as there was a large vintage tractor event running over on the Showground that weekend!! 😀

Good point Dave, and what exactly do museums do with book collections, I’ve never seen mention of access to this material?

NAM’s proposed new Visitor Centre will hopefully have a supervised Archive reading / viewing area as part of the ‘widening accessibility’ remit.

Donating to museums is very laudable but looking at it from the other side are the museums able to accept such donations?

Have people taken the time to notify the museum and advise them of their intentions?

I know at NAM that a lack of appropriate storage space means that not all ‘donations’ can be automatically accepted. When they are accepted, it is often on the basis that items {books, kits, collectables etc} that duplicate anything already held in the collection can be sold to raise funds for the museum, with the item that’s in a better condition being the one that’s retained.

Moving back to the opening point about notifying a museum of your intentions, this can lead to some interesting situations and commitments arising; e.g. as a result of such ‘notifications’ I am now the nominated Executor of two Wills!

Like many things in life, the principles involved seem very straightforward but the consequences can be very wide ranging.

Footnote added @ 11.35:

Currently the NAM Archive has circa 4,500 catalogued books; circa 970 catalogued APs; and a diverse collection of magazine sets.

…What do you do…? I’ve found amazing things and heartbreaking things… Id actually like the maritime stuff to have a wider ordinance… especially the war office stuff from the first world war!

All suggestions gratefully received…!

Zeb

National Maritime Museum?