The HRC thanks Julie Frey, Curator of Collections at the Litchfield Historical Society in Litchfield, CT, for volunteering to be a guest author for the following entry and for sharing her insight and experience with our readers.

Are you struggling to manage your museum's collection?

Are you unsure what records are important to properly document a new donation?

Are you stuck with an antiquated cataloging or numbering system?

Are there resources available that can help you?

Absolutely!

Managing museum collections is a crucial part of operating a successful museum. By having an up to date inventory and accessible accession records, museum staff can more easily create exhibitions, public programming and answer research requests.

While collections management is often a behind the scenes event, it is vital to the public aspect of museum work.

Collections management can be complicated however. If your museum has been around for over fifty years there is a good chance that the collection has more than one numbering system and spotty collections records.

You are not alone.

Collections staff everywhere are struggling to properly organize their collections.

Where do you begin?

The most important thing is to not start until you have a good understanding of the systems that previous collections staff used. Comb through the institutional records, read through the accession books and donor files, and talk to volunteers or previous employees who have worked with the collections. See what they did and you might begin to understand why they did it. This does not mean the system they used is the best but by researching their methods it will help you to make the best decisions in moving forward.

Next, you may want to buy a few reference books on collections management. These books have been written by experts in the field with decades of experience. They have seen it all and are ready to tackle the big questions. I have provided a few suggestions below.

• The New Museum Registration Methods by Rebecca A. Buck and Jean Allman Gillmore, published by the American Association of Museums

• Registration Methods for the Small Museum by Daniel B. Reibel, published by the American Association for State and Local History

• A Legal Primer on Managing Museum Collections by Marie C. Malaro

• The Revised Nomenclature for Museum Cataloging: A Revised and Expanded Version of Robert G. Chenhall's System for Classifying Man-Made Objects by James R. Blackaby published by the American Association for State and Local History

Finally, communicate your plan and objectives. Once you have decided on how you are going to organize the collection, talk to your director, the board president or your collections committee. Many of them have been in the museum field or a part of your institution for years and can act as a sounding board for any new ideas.

If they are unfamiliar with current registration methods take the time to educate them. Provide them with excerpts from books and magazine, direct them to websites or have a guest speaker from a nearby museum talk to them about the importance of collections management.

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