The Eastern Shore of Virginia Museum Network was formed 2 years ago in this small rural community separated from mainland Virginia by the Chesapeake Bay. Comprised of 6 small museums and the public library, the network collaborates on a variety of projects. The latest is a brochure of the regions history during the Civil War to commemorate the Sesquicentennial. Each of the participating museums has a role to play in the production of the brochure and since each museum represents a different perspective-from house museum, railway museum, history museum and natural history museum there will be much to discuss in the brochure.

Funding for the brochure comes in the form of a small grant from the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities (VFH). Read more…

     The Historic Crab Orchard Museum & Pioneer Park in Tazewell, Virginia interprets the lives of the people who have inhabited the Appalachian region for thousands of years. There is an emphasis however on the early European settlers who moved west from the Tidewater region in the 18^th & 19^th centuries. Run by a small dedicated staff of 4 full time and 4 part time and nearly 300 volunteers, this is a great place to visit.

The museum has many interesting exhibits that tell the stories of the Native Americans and European settlers who turned the wilderness into a thriving but isolated community. The railroad, coal mining, military history and the cultural heritage of the region are featured. The barn gallery tells the story of agriculture and features the implements that helped the settlers turn the wilderness into land for farming. Read more…

Six Simple Steps: Improve Your Collections Storage for a Few More Dollars or Donations!

 Bigger Bucks – Now that you’ve done such a great job organizing your storage you can ask for donations! Show your board what you’ve accomplished and show them what you still need to protect those valuable collections. Ask for donations from members, local businesses or foundations to help fund these items. Use the photos you’ve taken to document your progress!

• If you have space to hang clothing, make padded hangers for each item, hang them on a clothing rack and cover it with a washed muslin dust cover; if not, pad clothing, textiles and dimensional items with acid-free tissue; wrap small items in acid-free tissue or washed muslin and box them; pad and roll large flat textiles with the decorative side out and wrap them in a washed muslin cover.  
• House books (especially those with damaged bindings) in adjustable acid-free book covers.  
• Flatten maps, prints or other large documents and store them in a lockable metal flat file cabinet. Read more…

Six Simple Steps: Improve Your Collections Storage for Just a Few Dollars!

A few dollars can help you make a big difference. Be sure to ask your local hardware store for donations or a discount on some of these items. Take photos of your progress!

• Purchase acid-free storage boxes, files, envelopes, etc. as needed, and test old paper-based storage materials with a pH pen to ensure they are still acid-free, replace them with new ones.

• Take a look inside your storage boxes. Are documents, file folders, books, objects, etc. leaning against one another or sliding down in the box and curling? Make acid-free rigid supports/spacers to put inside the boxes so that the contents stay upright and are fully supported.

• Line wood shelf units with a barrier of acid-free mat board or inert foam sheeting; use barrier materials of acid-free mat board or inert foam material as needed between objects. Read more…

Improving your collections storage doesn’t have to cost big bucks! You can make a big difference just by doing a little housecleaning and reorganizing. Follow these six simple steps. Take photos of your progress!

Get Started:

• Designate a space just for collections storage! It should be a clean, dry space, preferably separate from other activities, ideally one that can be locked. (If all you have is a small space that must be shared with other storage or activities, separate them as much and as clearly as possible.)
• Remove any non-collection items (cleaning and exhibit supplies, sales items, office furniture and equipment, etc.) from the collections storage space and store them separately; remove and dispose of any inappropriate materials (broken equipment, cardboard boxes, paint cans, etc.)
• Avoid using collections pieces such as original furniture for storage: remove any items inside them and store them in acid-free materials. Read more…

  Museums that use technology can provide new ways to attract younger audiences to interact with and learn from exhibits. One new method is by using bar code symbols that can be “read” by smart phones, after reading the code, the phone automatically connects to a website that contains information about the place where the symbol is placed. QR codes (Quick Response) are black and white bar codes that allow the visitor to scan the code with their phone and that in turn brings them to the museum website. QR codes are widely used in industry to mark and inventory objects. The drawback is that they cannot be easily changed, point only to one website, they are in black and white and cannot be custom designed.

Microsoft, however, has designed bar code symbols that can be custom designed to reflect the museum logo, brand or some other symbol that is chosen to represent the museum and can be designed in color or black and white. Read more…

Successful small museums use strategic planning as a tool to insure that the mission and program of the institution are up to date and meet the needs of the museums’ constituents in the current environment and into the future. An important aspect of strategic planning is performing a SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. By examining each of these elements an organization can better understand where it stands and therefore can identify the strategies that will lead to success. Strengths and weaknesses focus on internal factors, while opportunities and threats focus on the external; using this information will allow for successful planning.

• Strengths may include the museums assets and collections, uniqueness, staff, membership, location, or community support.
• Weaknesses may be seen as inadequate space to expand exhibitions, poor cash flow, too many objects in storage, too few visitors, unclear mission, inadequate staffing, lack of sustainable funding, inadequate security.
• Opportunities may include focusing on marketing through social networking, websites and blogs; collaborating with other museums/community groups; revising mission; or offering focused programs to groups with a strong community presence.
• Threats may include competition from other organizations; loss of public funding; drop in attendance by school groups; or public reliance on interactive entertainment. Read more…

“The annual meeting of the American Association for State & Local History was held in Oklahoma City last week. The meeting was really very well organized for the 900+ museum staffers that attended. Because it was held in the West a special series of programming was offered for Native American museums. The keynote speaker was NPR’s own Susan Stamburg who spoke of her long association with and appreciation of museums and the work they do. Gerard Baker, a Mandan-Hidatsa indian from North Dakota also made a keynote address. As the recently retired superintendent of the Mount Rushmore National Park, he spoke of his long association with the Park Service and his fight to include Native voices in the interpretation of our National Parks. Mr. Baker’s talk was the highlight of the “Tribal Track” presentations. 

“All of the sessions that I attended were well organized and offered good information. I helped facilitate a session on “which history, whose history” which offered participants an opportunity to discuss what truths their visitors would like to know and whether they are the same as those that we offer in our interpretations. It was a lively and thoughtful discussion that helped participants think about what is important to their visitors. Following this same theme I attended a strategic planning session for small museums which uses survey and other forms of communication with audiences to help formulate the vision of the museum. And then attended a session on money vs mission which discussed staying true to one’s mission while developing new sources of funding. Read more…

The IRS has announced that small tax exempt organizations that have failed to submit required tax forms will automatically have their tax exempt status revoked after October 15, 2010. The rules have changed as a result of the Pension Protection Act of 2006 which requires revocation of tax exempt status for those failing to file for 3 consecutive years. The IRS is providing one-time relief for such organizations that normally file form 990N or 99EZ. This limited relief program helps small organizations preserve their status, but does not excuse them from reporting; the organizations affected by the ruling are those with gross receipts of $25,000 or less (990N) and those with gross receipts of less than $100,000 and total assets of less than $250,000 (990EZ).  To comply with the relief program 990N filers must submit their forms online prior to October 15, 2010. More… Read more…