SPRING CLEANING AND THE MUSEUM
As you do your spring cleaning this year you may come across some items that make you think “Hey, this is pretty old and cool, I bet the Murray County Historical Society would love to have this!” You would not be alone in thinking that. Each spring we see an uptick in people wanting to donate their family heirlooms or items they find while spring cleaning to the museum. And as much as we would love to take everything related to Murray County, we are unfortunately constrained by one major factor: space. We have been caring for Murray County artifacts for close to 75 years now, and in that time we have taken in countless objects. Because of that, we are getting fairly full up with our storage and we need to be selective with what we take in. However, that is not to say that we no longer take donations.
When looking at potential donations we have a collections committee who help us decide what to accept and what not to accept. They look at several criteria. Firstly, is the item a duplicate of something we already have in the collection? If for example, someone wanted to donate a Murray County atlas from 1908, we already have several in our collection. So even though it is related to Murray County and useful for research purposes, we do not need another when that space could be used for something we don’t already have. Second, is the artifact important to or tell a part of Murray County history? If for example, someone wanted to donate an old barbershop chair from a barbershop in Lyon County, we would be unlikely to accept it, as the artifact does not have a relation to Murray County and does not help tell the story of the people from here, even if it is a very cool old barbershop chair. A third consideration is space, we can store a historic document in an appropriate way much easier than we could store a larger object like a pump organ. Lastly, there is the condition of the object itself to consider. For example, we would likely not want to accept moldy clothes, as mold is an agent of decay and could spread to other objects in the collection.
I say all this not to deter anyone from donating, but rather to inform the public of what we DO want, as well as what to consider when making a donation. If you have something that has a great story from Murray County and can pass most of the criteria above, please call or email the museum and schedule a time to come in!
