Museum Sells Out

**Colin P. Varga** · 01-06-2011, 09:09 PM

Philadelphia Museum Sells Objects To Get A Face-Lift : NPR

I went to a sale of the the Historical Soc. of Pennsylvania had of material from the Balach Institute and much of it probably should not have been collected in the first place but there were pieces that certainly did tell of the ethnic history of Philadelphia. However, history is not really treasured by Philadelphians or Americans so keeping a large collection beyond the simple tastes of the public probably isn't warranted.

**Jayfar** · 01-06-2011, 09:53 PM

So I see too it's been renamed as The Philadelphia History Museum at the Atwater Kent.

Philadelphia History Museum

**CHIOSSO** · 01-07-2011, 08:32 AM

I am usually against change of any kind, but naming it The Philadelphia History Museum might bring more people in.

**raider.adam** · 01-07-2011, 09:28 AM

Originally Posted by Colin P. Varga

However, history is not really treasured by Philadelphians or Americans ...

Seriously?

**Dayman** · 01-07-2011, 09:35 AM

However, history is not really treasured by Philadelphians or Americans

F*cking wrong, plenty of Americans and Philadelphians love history, they just hate history class when rote memorization of "facts" is inflicted upon them.

**eldondre** · 01-07-2011, 09:37 AM

Originally Posted by CHIOSSO

I am usually against change of any kind, but naming it The Philadelphia History Museum might bring more people in.

I always thought it was an art museum of some kind

**CHIOSSO** · 01-07-2011, 10:11 AM

Its really great and it has some one of a kind stuff like this.

The Atwater Kent gibbet was made in 1781 to display the body of convicted pirate Thomas Wilkinson. He was to be hung on Windmill Island in the Delaware River off Market Street. so sailors on passing ships might be warned of the consequences of piracy.

The Gibbet

**desolate** · 01-07-2011, 10:11 AM

Originally Posted by Dayman

F*cking wrong, plenty of Americans and Philadelphians love history, they just hate history class when rote memorization of "facts" is inflicted upon them.

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**Colin P. Varga** · 01-07-2011, 10:17 PM

Originally Posted by raider.adam

Seriously?

Unfortunately, yes. Honestly, over the years Philadelphia institutions have sold off, given away, lost, thrown out some things and books truly relevent to Philadelphia's history or at least they were items of distinction.

**Colin P. Varga** · 01-07-2011, 10:33 PM

Originally Posted by Dayman

F*cking wrong, plenty of Americans and Philadelphians love history, they just hate history class when rote memorization of "facts" is inflicted upon them.

Love history? Maybe like history but not love. Have you been to the Franklin Court? It's pathetic. It hasn't been care for and it's run down and out of date. I took a foriegn visitor there a few years ago it was embarassing.

**CHIOSSO** · 01-07-2011, 11:15 PM

I love history.

**Dayman** · 01-08-2011, 12:52 AM

Originally Posted by Colin P. Varga

Love history? Maybe like history but not love. Have you been to the Franklin Court? It's pathetic. It hasn't been care for and it's run down and out of date. I took a foriegn visitor there a few years ago it was embarassing.

That's because it's boring as hell.

**FourS** · 01-12-2011, 08:55 AM

I was a research fellow at the Atwater Kent Museum for a year when I was in grad school and I can attest to the fact that they really needed to upgrade their facilities. Their collection is fantastic but far bigger than they could ever showcase in a building of that size. Deaccessioning was probably a good idea. With budgets as they are (city, state, federal) there isn't a whole lot sloshing around for museums. They even had to lay off a few long-time employees a few years ago. A museum should think really hard before it "sells out," but tightening up or focusing a collection isn't always a bad thing. It will hopefully allow them to more successfully perform their mission. I've been in one of their warehouses full of cool stuff. It is like Antiques Road Show x 1000 (or more). How many grandfather clocks does a museum of Philadelphia's history need? 10, 50, 100? At what point is the museum's interest better served by turning some of the cool stuff into capital improvements.

The name change was a good idea too, but A. Atwater Kent isn't someone who should be forgotten.

**FourS** · 01-12-2011, 09:03 AM

And I love history too. Being that it encompasses everything that happened before today, how could it be boring? It is often presented in a boring way, granted, but Philly is bubbling over with history. Take out of town guests to the 9th Street (Italian) Market or to the Blue Horizon for a history lesson if they don't dig powdered wigs.

**mixiboi** · 01-15-2011, 11:31 PM

I think they sold out when they got their new logo:

**CHIOSSO** · 01-16-2011, 12:12 AM

looks like an eye chart.

**Colin P. Varga** · 01-16-2011, 10:49 PM

Originally Posted by FourS

I was a research fellow at the Atwater Kent Museum for a year when I was in grad school and I can attest to the fact that they really needed to upgrade their facilities. Their collection is fantastic but far bigger than they could ever showcase in a building of that size. Deaccessioning was probably a good idea. With budgets as they are (city, state, federal) there isn't a whole lot sloshing around for museums. They even had to lay off a few long-time employees a few years ago. A museum should think really hard before it "sells out," but tightening up or focusing a collection isn't always a bad thing. It will hopefully allow them to more successfully perform their mission. I've been in one of their warehouses full of cool stuff. It is like Antiques Road Show x 1000 (or more). How many grandfather clocks does a museum of Philadelphia's history need? 10, 50, 100? At what point is the museum's interest better served by turning some of the cool stuff into capital improvements.

The name change was a good idea too, but A. Atwater Kent isn't someone who should be forgotten.

I too have been in the Atwater Kent storage area, but didn't get to the warehouse. Deaccessioning is important to keep a collection focused, there is no question about that. Often times people give things to musuems and the museum doesn't want it but the museum can't say no at the risk of offending a donor that might donate something in the future that might be more in line with the collection of the museum. So many museums get stuck with crap, and this should be deaccessioned. The AWK's crap probably would not provide much in the way of capitol improvements. The report from NPR mentioned a Peale painting being sold. This quality and historically significant type of material is the issue.

The number of one type of item isn't the issue, but are items which are important to Philadelphia's history leaving the public arena for the private arena? And will this private arena service the people of Philadelphia? The AWK's exhibit area was extremely small compared to its collection, but I don't believe the collection was the problem rather that the museum building is too small to be the history museum of Philadelphia. Of course how do you get a bigger museum? Well, this truly is a problem with a public that is so apathic or bears some antipathy towards history because "it's boring". It's unlikely that the AWK was going to get a bigger museum; although it did happen to the Please Touch Museum.

**MarketStEl** · 01-17-2011, 12:26 AM

Originally Posted by Colin P. Varga

Unfortunately, yes. Honestly, over the years Philadelphia institutions have sold off, given away, lost, thrown out some things and books truly relevent to Philadelphia's history or at least they were items of distinction.

The most notable recent "deaccsssioning" more refutes than affirms your point, IMO.

I'm referring to Thomas Jefferson University's decision to sell its Thomas Eakins masterpiece "The Gross Clinic" to a Walmart heiress who was building an American art museum in the Waltons' hometown of Bentonville, Ark.

Jefferson alumni consider the work the ultimate representation of their mission and why they attended, and they shut their wallets tight after the news broke. Philadelphians of all stripes (including me) opened theirs to donate to a successful last-minute fundraising campaign to keep the painting here, launched by its current co-owners, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

And lest we forget, the Atwater Kent^W^WPhiladelphia History Museum at the Atwater Kent has such a large collection in part because it inherited the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's when the HSP decided to get out of the museum business. One of those objects cannot be displayed by either institiution: John Wanamaker's office, which for years had been preserved intact in the southwest corner of the store's eighth floor before the store was sold to May Department Stores. What does one do with an object like that?

Originally Posted by CHIOSSO

looks like an eye chart.

An eye chart is easier to read and more attractive. IMO that's one of the worst logo redesigns I've seen in quite some time.

However, the renaming of the institution is a very good idea - the average out-of-town visitor not only has no idea who Atwater Kent was but would not know that a museum bearing the man's name is the city's official history museum. The better way to preserve Mr. Kent's memory would be with an exhibit devoted to him and his company within the museum. Atwater Kent was a radio pioneer whose company was the archrival of RCA up until 1937, when he shut down the company rather than accept collective bargaining after a successful union drive. I assume the museum bears his name because he donated money to create it in the original home of the Franklin Institute, which vacated the building in 1933.

**boblee** · 01-17-2011, 02:31 AM

Here is another article from the NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/ar...pagewanted=all

The problem is not de-accessioning, the problem is lack of accountability and oversight. The fact that the people in charge have no list of what has been sold should tell anyone that there is a big problem here. A lot of Philadelphia cultural instututions are run like little fiefdoms. This was true of the Penn. Academy when Frank Goodyear was president, and he sent most of the European art to Sotheby's while buying office furniture and wall-to-wall carpeting, and basically lying to the Orphan's Court in order to break a legacy, which he did, in order to sell off a stack of Old Master drawings.

**FourS** · 01-17-2011, 08:24 AM

Originally Posted by boblee

The fact that the people in charge have no list of what has been sold should tell anyone that there is a big problem here.

I'm sure there is a very precise list. The article you linked states that 2595 items were sold through local auction houses and an additioal 64 through Christie's. Those are pretty precise numbers. You seem to be alluding to malfesance or incompitence, neither of which are the issue. The only questions are whether an institution like this should be totally transparent (which might negatively impact future donations) and whether an institution like this should deaccession to pay for capital improvements (a very valid question).