State of American Museums

[DennyB]

I was on the Board of Directors of a small county museum for two years. It was located in an old bank and the safe was used to store things. Of course I put a military display together using donated display cases. We had several WW2 class A uniforms and some field gear mostly but we did have a HJ armband that an old man brought in that he had taken from a german soldier toward the end of the war. We had to remove it when the other board members said that it may offend someone. I eventually lost interest when about all they would allow was the dress uniforms that the soldiers had worn home so I packed up my weapons that I had on loan as well as the manniquin wearing a surcoat, stahlhelm and full accoutrements and brought them home.
They basically wanted to show the Home Front and not the fighting part of the war. One of the members complained that it appeared that I was building a shrine to Nazism and didn't think that we should display anything that might be construed as "glorifying" the Germans or Japanese. It was funny because there was actually only one swastika showing, aside from the armband in the case, and that was on the Gott Mit Uns belt buckle on the manniquin.

[eindecker2]

that sounds great - lets just all forget that there was an enemy - heck, lets just let people think that from 1941-1945 American boys and men just went overseas for a vacation, they came back and got medals... I think that even if it offends someone, that means something - it reminds us that there is and has been 'evil' in the world (I put that in ' ' because its what everyone assocaites Nazi Germany to well, 'evil'- lets just forget that Japaneese officers tortured and killed these US Serivceman 'tourists' and then ate their internal organs and flesh. I doubt anyone would be half offened at you puting up a captured Japanese flag - it just has a pretty sunrise on it!) Off the soap box now....

[Siegfried]

I don't know whether I should jump in here or not. It just happens that I work for a major state museum where I run the conservation laboratories, deal directly with the artifacts and their care, am in constant contact with the curators and registrars, and am also on the museum's Aquisition Commitee.
What has been said on this thread is for a large part true, but mostly for other reasons...the biggest is money. I am always amazed at how much money it actually costs to put on a major exhibit--done right that is. We have a huge collection (yes, some great WWII German things too) and it takes full time staff to maintain it.
Yes, most of it is in storage--a museum does not display all its collection, a big reason being that display is actually harder on the objects than storage (good museum storage, that is), so things get rotated when possible. The exhibit folks and conservators get antsy when an exhibit has been up more than a couple years...but often it cannot be helped because of funding; and even the most popular exhibits must come down eventually to give the artifacts a rest.
Actually a museum is more a storehouse than an exhibit hall.
However, most all major museums will grant access to its artifacts on an appointment request basis. If a serious person wanted to examine a certain few objects he can set up an appointment and one of the staff will be glad to have the objects brought to an examination area for that person to see--however it must be remembered that the staff has many requests and an appointment time must be set up so the object(s) can be brought out etc. But this sort of thing is done all the time.

As for selling off extra...sure we would love to be able to do that, but established museum standards have lengthly ethical procedures for that--this in effort to prevent unethical profiteering by those in charge. We as a state museum must go through the aquisition commitee for proposals and justification (sort of a reversal of aquiring something) and then the candidate object list must go before the State Historic Commission--they are the only ones who have the power to deassession something, the museum itself doesn't. This process can be quite time consuming (they only meet twice a year) and has lots of stopgaps. Only then can these objects be dumped--usually at public auction.

Aquiring something must be justified in front of the aquisition commitee by the curator who thinks it should be accepted (donated or purchased). So things here are not accepted lightly. The proposed object must fall within our museum's 'mission statement'--which in our particular case has to be tied in with our state's history in some way. In other words we could accept a German war souvenir captured by a soldier from our state, but would not accept, for example, a Confederate uniform made and used only in another state.

Of course I only speak of what I am familiar with and cannot speak for other museums (nor even officially for ours), but I can assure you that most major museums adhere to standard museum practices set up by the various national and international professional associations.
I would be glad to answer questions about museum practices in general, and if I don't know the answer off hand, I could just go down the hall and ask someone else.

[nutmeg]

Some of the worst cases of "theft" are at the hands of so-called "curators"of museums.
The Atlanta Historical Society was pillaged of many rare Confederate items some years back by one particular collector-curator.
I've decided that the very best way to preserve historical items is to offer them for SALE by museums;those items rotting away in storage which are'nt being preserved due to lack of funds.
It would be a good way for museums to increase revenue while actually preserving historical relics by individuals really interrested in preserving them and having the means to do it.

If it's who I think it is the story is untrue. It was rumor started by a few dealers to force the curator out of office so they could pillage the collection. He was on to what was afoot and he needed to be removed. This was basically done by creating a slander campaign against the man which eventually suceeded, he being unware of it until the damage was already done. The collection was pillaged after he was gone I am told by reliable sources. The dealers who did this are extremely unsavory types and have subsequently been discredited themselves.

[Doug Kenwright]

At one time, the Canadian War Museum had the best collection of German uniforms in the western world.The size of the collection of tunics took up two rooms. Included were Meyers uniform when captured, Gen. Blaskowitzs' (sp) who surrendered the Netherlands to the Canadians..etc etc etc...

When the collection was audited for the move to the the new location of the museum, do you know how many they found? None.As many collectors here can attest, there were dealers who back doored these items..racks at a time..to be sold on the fledgling military show scene..it's disgusting and true..