Paul LaVallee

Period 1, Kaplan
Motives
For many years our past has been documented in different forms, developing
all the way from the nomadic times rock carvings to the present days immense
museum buildings. The contents of these buildings are often debated on immensely
due to the task of balancing a museums economic and educational value. However,
the artifacts a museum seeks out can stabilize a struggling museum if these pieces
are historically accurate and work towards drawing attention from the public.
Although history is constantly changing and being left behind us, museums
offer the rare opportunity to keep pieces of the past alive and should seek out
artifacts that best educate the public on our history. With preserving a culture we
are able to add and maintain cultural diversity in our society thus allowing a broad
range of ideas and traditions to flow through one cultural community. The national
museum of the American Indian argues that the cultural artifacts they possess have
significance because the collections span all major cultural areas of the Americas
(Source C). Covering almost all of the Western hemispheres culture in one building
exposes the public to a massive spectrum of ideas and practices that then can be
carried and survive further through these people. This same museum adds that
their institution provides the preservation, study, exhibition of life, languages,
literature, history, and arts of Native Americans (Source C). The National American
Indian museum is a well established museum in the DC area, the heart of the
museum community, and lists their main purpose as preservation and education.
Coming from an experienced and successful museum educating the public should

be the primary concern for a museum. Education is why museums are open.
Education is their purpose. And education should be a major motive when acquiring
artifacts. If museums are solely basing their acquisitions off of profitability then the
museums are opening a gift shop rather than a museum store and it has little
justification for existence (source D). What our society doesnt need is another little
gift shop that dupes people into throwing their money into worthless plastic. What
we need is for better educated citizens. Museums must do their part in educating
the people by buying pieces that serve this purpose.
While educating the public is a primary concern of museums, this would not
be possible without the flow of resources that come with collecting pieces that
support the museum financially and should be an equal if not greater motive for
museums when gathering artifacts. David Rockefeller, a son of the Rockefeller
family that funded Colonial Williamsburg, discusses that in his experience two
critical problems threatened the institution: money and management while these
problems plummeted operating deficit [to] approached one million (source A).
Although possessing a collection of purely educational pieces is the goal of many
museums, this fantasy is simply unattainable in its impracticality. As a museum, to
stay open and do its duty of educating the public it must work within your budget
and keep this in mind as it adds to its collection. A museums educational capability
is dependent on the funding that supports it. Mary Theobald argues that museums
often get caught up in prioritizing money over the educational and preservation
aspect of why a museum is there (source D). But what Theobald fails to
acknowledge is the point that if a museum is selling off replicas of its art, this art is
not only being spread further through a community as it is not grounded to the
museum, but the pieces aesthetic value is acknowledged as well. At times we are

consumed in what the artifact is teaching and neglect the beauty in each piece of
history. With this museums should make sure that some of their artifacts are able to
sell in shops. With the support of that individual piece there is another aspect of
reselling where the museum generated funds that allow them to finance new
acquisitions (source A). With a more flexible budget, museums have the resources
to go after pieces with a higher educational value because they have the means to
attain them. Critiques tend to take extremely polarized viewpoints where they argue
that museums should acquire pieces that either educate or profit the museum. On
the contrary, the museums legitimate concern should not be money or education
but money and education (source D).
This balance between the economic and educational value of artifacts can be
maintained through accuracy in historical pieces and an entertaining aspect to most
if not all exhibits to ensure public curiosity and enjoyment. Some historical sites
have gone out of this balance and in exaggerating sites attractiveness they are
depriving the public of the truth in a piece of history. Richard and Eric Gable point
out this issue in Colonial Williamsburg which has taught Americans to believe in- a
sanitized version of the past (Source E) mocking the lighthearted
misrepresentation of Williamsburgs ugly past. In this case the public is being
educated but they never truly get an accurate picture of what Williamsburg was.
Sites should prioritize the accuracy of each artifact they collect because an artifact
should represent our past for what it was and not what we hope it was. By not
warping the past a museum has the ability to preserve out of date point of views,
untouched evidence, and pieces of how our world used to be. In doing this a
museum is educating the public and serving its purpose in society. In addition,
presenting history in its true form is done best while entertaining the public.

Museums such as the first national history museum utilized the uniqueness of
their field to capture the attention of the public using unique and strange specimens
lined up in rows for viewing (Source B). Everyone has experienced the drab lecture
in your least favorite class or witnessed the agonizing uninterested pain in the faces
of toddlers being practically dragged through art museums. What Peale
accomplished in his first museum was enchanting the public with something unique
while simultaneously using this interest to teach them. As people our brains are
most active and absorb the most information when we are engaged by an outside
stimulus and probed to react to it. The Smithsonian air and space museum improves
upon Peales idea of entertainment with education by putting in pieces such as the
visually captivating rockets and simulators that engage your dormant senses.
Walking through that bustling museum all ages rush through whipping their heads
wildly back and forth fascinated by the science in front of them. As they walk out
their mouths run rampant with excitement over the information they just absorbed
and the whole time everyone has a smile on their face. This is the best type of
education. Not only are they supporting the museums continuation and
improvement by visiting but they are enjoying their time at the museum and
learning something while they are at it.
This is the purpose of a museum and all museums should strive to shape
themselves in the hope of creating an entertaining, educating, and accurate
learning environment.