Category Archives: Uncategorized

From Critique to “Clean House”: Evaluating Mike Gonzalez’s Testimony on the Smithsonian

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At a congressional hearing on July 21, Mike Gonzalez of the Heritage Foundation accused the Smithsonian’s leadership of subverting its national purpose and called upon Congress to “clean house.” He also urged lawmakers to deauthorize the proposed National Museum of the American Latino and Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum before either institution has opened a permanent building.

His statement is important—not because it provides an independent or particularly rigorous evaluation of the Smithsonian, but because it reveals how quickly the argument has moved from criticizing exhibitions to demanding the removal of museum leaders.

The July 4 White House report, properly titled Saving America’s Story, accused the National Museum of American History of “ideological capture” and concluded that the Smithsonian could not be trusted under its current leadership. Gonzalez largely repeats that report’s assumptions and examples, but goes further by calling explicitly for a purge.

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Engaging Places: What’s Next?

Hello everyone!

Regular posts by me have been infrequent this year (and even last year!) due to an incredible amount of projects that have come across my desk, as well as travels here in the US and abroad.

Thankfully, Colin Gliniecki has helped with several posts on the financial condition of history organizations, which is part of a bigger personal project on strengthing the financial sustainability of historic sites and house museums. Colin received an MA in Museum Studies from George Washington University four years ago and with his undergraduate degree in business, I’ve relied on his extraordinary skills with Excel to analyze enormous sets of Form 990 data. (If anyone needs a museum data analyst, I’m happy to make an introduction.) We’ve finished the foundational series of posts around revenues and expenses and are now taking a step back to reflect on the work and determine next steps.

So next on the blog are more regular posts from me (weekly?), but they may take a variety of forms such as:

  • “reports from the field,” where I describe clever ideas from the museums and historic sites I encounter in my travels.
  • “reports from my garden,” describing what’s happening in my GW courses and commissioned projects.
  • books that are affecting my thinking about the management and interpretation of historic sites
  • personal projects (such as the Interpreting Christmas book)

I may be late to the game, but I believe video is the next big format that museums and historic sites need to embrace for interpretation and promotion. I’ve been testing the waters with a few videos, being pushed into the deep end by the pandemic when teaching went online:

The challenge is that video production is sloooooow but I’m determined to master it–and the only way to do it is by doing a lot of it. I’ve produced three in 2020, seven in 2023, so I definitely need to ramp up. Warning: the videos will be rough and drafty this year, so I’ll appreciate comments and suggestions!

More soon!

Demystifying Spending Patterns in Small Museums

In the world of small museums, location and audience significantly influence expenses, rendering a one-size-fits-all approach ineffective. However, gaining insight into the various types of expenses museums incur can shed light on common challenges and their causes. The non-profit financial Form 990 categorizes expenses into five areas, providing a framework for understanding spending patterns. Our goal is to simplify the concept of museum spending and guide museums toward prudent budget management by exploring these key expense categories.

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Untangling the “Other” Revenue Stream

In the colorful tapestry of history-focused organizations, every thread of revenue has a role to play in the success of the organization. Perhaps the most unique collection of these threads is the “Other” revenue category. This singular “Other” thread houses a miscellany of revenue sources that don’t fit into the categories of “Investment Income”, “Program Service Revenue”, and “Contributions and Grants”. At first glance, this classification may appear insignificant, yet it often proves to be a silent contributor that underpins the fiscal health of History-Focused Organizations [Museums (NTEE A50), History Museums (A54), History Organizations (A80), and Historical Societies & Historic Preservation (A82)].

Understanding this “Other” revenue can be like deciphering an ancient dialect. It is made no easier by the fact that IRS Form 990 at times uses the terms revenue and income interchangeably. While some categories of this revenue such as royalties and inventory sales may be familiar, “miscellaneous” often contains difficult to parse odds and ends such as third-party events, insurance proceeds, ATM fees, and revenue from hosting satellite towers. Most often this miscellaneous revenue is unspecified and simply named “miscellaneous” or “other” which can make it difficult to get the full picture of a particular institution’s revenue sources. We advise limiting the classification of your total revenue as “miscellaneous” to no more than 1%. While judicious use of this category can help define your other revenue streams more clearly, overuse could lead to a lack of clarity about a significant portion of your revenue. It is crucial to maintain a comprehensive understanding of your financial situation.

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Impact, Sustainability, and Non-Profit Programs

For small non-profit organizations operating on less than a million dollars annually, programs are often the beating heart of the operation. The best programs balance mission and financial sustainability to serve their audiences. Program revenue (admissions, events, and membership dues) can be a vital means of maintaining financial stability and growth. For History-Focused Organizations [Museums (NTEE A50), History Museums (A54), History Organizations (A80), and Historical Societies & Historic Preservation (A82)] as overall revenue grows, so does the share of program revenue. This means as your organization grows, so should the prominence of your programs as a true revenue driver (see figure 1 below).

As small history-focused organizations expand, it’s crucial to manage their programs wisely to increase income while keeping the mission in mind. For small groups, program decisions can be very personal, often influenced by board or staff interests. Taking a strategic approach to these decisions can boost the organization’s growth and success.

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What Drives Revenue at History-Focused Organizations?

If a well-managed museum has robust programming, a large endowment, and a profitable gift shop, should they still rely on contributions and grants? Often regarded as a fundraising burden to reduce or eliminate, instead we might want to consider these revenue sources as one of the best ways to sustain and expand an institution. Sixty-six percent of History-Focused Organizations [Museums (NTEE A50), History Museums (A54), History Organizations (A80), and Historical Societies & Historic Preservation (A82)] depend on contributions and grants for at least half of their annual revenue and nearly forty percent rely on contributions and grants for more than three-quarters of their revenue (see Figure 1 below).

To maximize revenue, museums must navigate fundraising in the present and future. Understanding the donor and engagement pyramids simplifies fundraising and ensures focus. Small history-focused organizations, in particular, must invest their limited bandwidth strategically to achieve success.

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The Field of Local History at Your Fingertips—Free!

The third edition of the Encyclopedia of Local History, edited by Amy Wilson, is now available for free to members of the American Association for State and Local History. The print version is a nearly two-inch thick, 814-page resource to a wide range of topics related to the issues and practices in local history, but now available digitally as a pdf to AASLH members. This edition includes my contributions on mission, vision, values and house museums in the 21st century, plus a photo of the Gamble House—but there are dozens of experts who share their knowledge of the field in one place.

For more details, visit the AASLH Resource Center or you’re not a member, you can purchase it for $161.50 (hmm, membership is less than half that cost).

Reimagining Historic House Museums Workshops Returning in 2023

Our last Reimagining House Museums workshop was held at Dumbarton House in Washington, DC in June 2019!

Ken Turino and I will once again lead our workshops on reimagining historic house museums in 2023 after taking several years off due to the pandemic. Our first workshop will be held at the Gamble House in Pasadena, California on Friday, April 1 and our second will be held at the Decorative Arts Center of Ohio in Lancaster, Ohio on Thursday, June 22. AASLH is managing the workshop and registration is $325 but it’s $200 for AASLH members (and it’s $150 if you register by February 1!). Participation is limited to 25 people for the April workshop.

The workshop is closely related to the book, Reimagining Historic House Museums (2019), but we take a much deeper dive into the challenges facing house museums, assess current programs against a “double-bottom” line for a big-picture perspective, analyze the five forces that affect programs and events to find opportunities and obstacles, and highlight some of the ways that house museums have reinvented themselves. The day is packed with information and activities, but we take a good break in the middle of the day for lunch and we get to meet lots of other people who are working hard to make their historic site better. Plus it’s great fun!

How can History-Focused Organizations Invest in Stability?

Figure 1. History-Focused Organizations command large portions of the museum field’s revenue and institutions. Source: Internal Revenue Services and National Center for Charitable Statistics.

Over the past year, Engaging Places has been looking over individual segments of the museum field. While these segments are unique in specific ways, as demonstrated by the data, several of them do share a common theme and mission: an overall goal to promote history. These four segments are History Museums (A54), History Organizations (A80), Historical Societies & Historic Preservation (A82), as well as the broad Museums (A50) category. By combining these segments we can focus on the history-centric portion of the museum field that makes up close to half of its revenue and consists of a whopping 89% of its institutions (see Figure 1). This block of museums is incredibly dominant within the field and a major focus of Engaging Places’ work. For ease of reference, we will be referring to them as History-Focused Organizations.

It is important to remember that as an aggregate these History-Focused Organizations still trend small. Over 90% operate on less than $1 million in revenue annually, with contributions and grants bringing in over half of that vital revenue. For these smaller museums, financial security is a constant and essential priority. While many of these History-Focused Organizations are unable to achieve large pools of investment to stabilize operations, unlike some of their larger counterparts, they can develop practices to move them in this direction. 

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Malaro Symposium Welcomes DC Museum Professionals

Kaywin Feldman, director, National Gallery of Art

This Friday, April 1 from 4-6 pm, the Museum Studies Program hosts the 24th Malaro Symposium in Hammer Auditorium at the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design, 500 17th Street, NW (enter from the side entrance on New York Avenue). Admission is free. The annual symposium is held in honor of Marie Malaro, the longtime chair of the Museum Studies Program and author of the landmark book, A Legal Primer on Managing Museum Collections. Kaywin Feldman, director of the National Gallery of Art, will discuss museums in uncompromising times, and we’ll have three students share highlights from their award-winning research papers:

  • Avery Barth, “New Archives, New Practices: Exploring the Digitial Transgender Archive”
  • Norman Storer Corrada, “Austerity and Access: The Ongoing Challenges of the Institute of Puerto Rican Culture National Collection”
  • Haley Higinbotham, “The Utilization of Technology to Show the Polychromy of Ancient Art”

Because the pandemic has reduced opportunities for museum professionals to get together to catch up, we’ll be hosting a special reception afterward for those who live and work in the DC region. It’ll be a nice chance to close out the week and celebrate spring. Admission is free and we’d appreciate registration in advance at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/24th-annual-marie-c-malaro-awards-symposium-tickets-294889611767