[NHCOLL-L:335] Re: Accession Question

[Stuart Fullerton]

My opinion: if you try this with entomological collections you will never
sleep again nor visit the lunch room together again.

with 1,000,000 + species of named insecs in the world, with a total
projection of a possible 16-17 million species a committiee would be
lethal and wind up with the top 10.  often species within taxa remain
unknown untill a specialist is avialable and has the opportunity to view
all the specimens within the taxa group.  examples of new species showing
up in old collections is very common.  The function of a committie is to
slow down of not stop the growth of a collection. Unless the committee is
of insect folks, any and all additons will be viewed as "just another pile
of dead bugs" a problem i run into here with the dept chair. but boy is he
happier then hell when a new species (4 to date) are identified and
published. (and is just from an area with a radius of 20 miles) at the
moment we have a specialist that is noting two possible new genera, and
recent work by a grad student has noted a whole family of critters that
are not known from anywhere in the state but the northern border.  thanks to
improper sorting by myself, they had been stuck in an entirely different
family.

do what y ou will but give me no committiees. committies can be used to
raise money, not conserve it, build larger facilites, and not stiffle the
concept of a collection.  keep them out of the collections.

cheers!  and have a great discussion about this!

rof



On Wed, 17 Nov 1999, Jane MacKnight wrote:

> I am planning to establish a New Acquisitions Committee to review all
> proposed acquisitions prior to accepting/accessioning.  While this is
> standard practice in history, art and other non-science museums, the natural
> history curators here claim that it is not standard practice in natural
> history museums.  There are strong feelings that the curator is the only
> person qualified to make the decision.  I agree that the curator should make
> the recommendation based on knowledge of the collection, scientific basis
> etc.  However, other staff are more knowledgeable about space priorities,
> finances, legal and permit issues, needs of education and exhibit programs,
> political issues etc.  I'd like to know what procedures other natural
> history museums employ to accept new acquisitions.  If you use a committee
> how does it work, who participates etc?  Please respond off list.  Thanks in
> advance.
> 
> Jane
> 
> 
> Jane MacKnight
> Registrar and Director of Collections
> Cincinnati Museum Center
> 1301 Western Avenue
> Cincinnati, OH 45203
> Tel: 513/287-7092
> Fax: 513/287-7095
> Email: jmacknight at cincymuseum.org
> 
> 

Stuart M Fullerton ROF, Research Associate in charge of Arthropod
Collections (UCFC), Biology Dept. University of Central Florida, Orlando,
Florida, 32816, USA. stuartf at pegasus.cc.ucf.edu