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frank_petran
Senior Member
Username: frank_petran
Post Number: 80
Registered: 05-2009
| | Posted on Saturday, January 30, 2010 - 08:15 pm: | 
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Again, It is nice to see the engines going to good home but a thought just came to me. I am also into old wood boats and I have several of them and I am starting to collect old marine engines so what happens to all this neat stuff when we aren't around to give them a good home. The cost of collecting our toys is rising and the younger folks don't have the free money that most of us have so they get disgusted and walk away from the hobby. A lot of our children don't even share the same interested that we do. It isn't instant gratification so it is left behind. I know that trying to interest the youth in old wood boats if really an uphill battle for our organization, The Antique and Classic Boat Society. I brought 3 old engines to the Milwaukee Boat Show last week and 95% of the people who stopped and looked at the display were people with the same color hair as mine, somewhat Grey. I'll post the pictures tomorrow. I don't have an answer to this problem of making sure the hobby carries on along with the history of it but I would sure could use some input. I'll copy this on to a new topic. |
miro
Senior Member
Username: miro
Post Number: 425
Registered: 11-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, January 31, 2010 - 10:34 am: |
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Frank - you bring up a good point.
But I wouldn't worry too much about things like the cost of our hobby.
When you were starting out - everything was too expensive and then magically - once you got going, things kinda sorted themselves out.
As it turns out, the cost of the stuff isn't what matters - the issue is "in whose hands does it reside? "
After all the last shirt you wear has no pockets.
The greedy ones make themselves very evident, very quickly - and I view them as somewhat pathetic and missing out on the more important parts of the hobby.
The stuff after all is only some cast iron, some brass, gasket material etc - the important thing is whose hands that material is touched by.
miro |
ernie
Senior Member
Username: ernie
Post Number: 1152
Registered: 01-2002
| | Posted on Monday, February 01, 2010 - 10:00 am: |
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That all being said I am going to start thinning my collection as I don't want my wife to have to deal with it. Also I want to make sure they go where I want them to go. I have engines I havn't run or even touched in years. Some not since 1997 when I moved into my current house.
What is the point of even owning those? No there WON'T be a list however some of you will hear form me as most of us here are true collectors.
As to museums that is the last place any of my stuff will go. Case in point is a museum that changed management or focus in the last year or so and just got rid of all that old stuff. |
searcher
Senior Member
Username: searcher
Post Number: 409
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Monday, February 01, 2010 - 03:03 pm: |
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Upon my demise, my wife is apt to call up the local junk man and tell him to get all my old iron off the property ASAP. Consequently, I have pondered how best to see that my collection avoids that fate. Ernie's comments about museums stirred some sour memories. Back in the 70's and early 80's I assembled as complete a blacksmith shop as any smith in Maine around 1900 ever had, including an early 1500 lb power hammer that came out of a local shop. Everything was signed, dated, or both and nothing was repaired or needed repairing. I offered to donate that collection to a museum in it's entirety to be part of a specific exhibit the museum was assembling. They loved the collection but what they really wanted was for me to give them the right to sell it immediately following execution of the donation paperwork. I had some choice words in response to that request but kept them to myself (and kept the blacksmith collection as well). On another occasion I donated a rather spectacular specimen of massive chalcopyrite found in Maine to a museum here. The last I knew nobody had a clue as to what happened to that specimen. I have a couple of other first hand incidents in the same vein I could relate but enough said. The iron collection will not be going to a museum, that is certain.
In the end, I came to the conclusion that I wanted all my iron dispursed back into the hands of collectors. Auctioning the collection off seemed to be a fair way to accomplish that. However, I remember an auction at the Owl's Head Transportation Museum some years ago in which there many marine engines up for sale. One individual bid on and won most of the engines up to the point when his pilot informed him that the plane was at maximum weight and couldn't hold any more. So, the less well heeled collectors weren't in the game until the well to do collector maxed out the carrying capacity of his plane. That ain't gonna cut it either.
I am glad the whole subject came up and hope it results in a lot of thought and response.
I'm not ready to let go of my iron yet, so, Ernie, if you decide to cull out any Maine made engines I would be interested. |
robert
Senior Member
Username: robert
Post Number: 344
Registered: 07-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 01, 2010 - 06:57 pm: |
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Wise words. Many museums are better than the scrap yard, but only just! |
bgoss
Senior Member
Username: bgoss
Post Number: 139
Registered: 12-2007
| | Posted on Monday, February 01, 2010 - 07:32 pm: |
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Amen Ernie.
There's no shortage of people around who have learned valuable lessons about museums through the 70's, 80's and 90's. I don't expect that to change in the 00's or 10's. |
richarddurgee
Senior Member
Username: richarddurgee
Post Number: 2311
Registered: 11-2001
| | Posted on Monday, February 01, 2010 - 10:00 pm: |
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*
There is a special and unique word for the process of a Museum selling its collection objects, " Disaccessioning ", likewise the buying or taking in process is " accessioning *
More than 40 yrs of collecting mostly marine antiques I have to say that Museums are what we make of them, How about the Wonderful annual old engine get together at Mystic, Scott N.and crew sure put a lot of effort into the occasion and for myself they have always treated me like Gold when i was there, what better place to meet old and new friends and collectors and be able to dislay and run our old marine iron ? Mystic has come a long ways with its own marine engine collection and is probably the most extensive of its kind ?
Calvert Museum was my first experience with an old marine engine show, Richard Dodd, Ms Phelps and the helpful volunteers and staff go out of their way to see that the show is as good as it can be, I wouldn't trade those times for anything, I met so many interesting and capable people there and many are friends that I would have never met otherwise !
Cheapeake Bay Museum across the bay from Calvert has one building dedicated to old marine engines,
Marine Maritime Museum in Norfolk is another wonderful Marine engine museum, yrs ago when trying to identify a very old engine that they had once again the young lady curator of that section was just as helpful and gracious as possible.
I have a list of many maritime oriented museums around our country and one of my wishes is to be able to visit most of them before my family is faced with -What do we do with all of these old iron things -?
To display your item or items in a museum for what ever reason, just loan them to the museum and of course get proper paper work, you or your heirs can take them back or leave them, but you have the option. I have an old Wonder eng that spent many yrs on display in a museum and I bought it from the heirs that chose to take it back. One of my most favorites is an old well worn and tired looking 1890's Lackawanna enbloc triple cylinder marine eng that was "deaccessioned " many yrs ago by the Henry Ford museum, wasn't up to standards of being displayed there and ended up in my private collection.
Museums are a part of this wonderful hobby of ours and their on going preservations and history certainly add a richness and depth that I respect and appreciate.
* |
frank_petran
Senior Member
Username: frank_petran
Post Number: 81
Registered: 05-2009
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 - 11:53 am: |
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The succession of our hobby is not to have everything end up in a museum so that it can be set up in a display once and then relegated to the back storage area until it is deaccessioned to the junk man because there isn't anyone who is interested in our pride and joys. People’s interests change. We as a group need to figure out how to have a lot more of the younger people become involved in our hobby. But if we as a group continue to believe in the adage, ”that he who has the most toys when they die wins”, does not help the matter. I am somewhat guilty of that. This leads to the have and have nots because of the costs of our toys that keeps rising which intern discourages the younger people who do not have the discretionary funds to get into the hobby. I know that when I was younger with a wife, 2 children, a dog and a mortgage finding extra money was hard. My wife reminds me of the times when we would sit on a bluff and look at the wood boats in the harbor and wish we could afford to buy one. It took many years to achieve that goal but it sure would have been nice to be able to do it then. |
keith
Senior Member
Username: keith
Post Number: 275
Registered: 02-2002
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 - 03:37 pm: |
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Question: When a Museum deaccessions a piece, what happens to it?
Answer: It goes back in the hands of a collector. They, like us, were just caretakers for a period of time. It would appear the bigger issue, as expressed in the above post, is the loss of control as to what happens with the item. |
bgoss
Senior Member
Username: bgoss
Post Number: 141
Registered: 12-2007
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 - 07:05 pm: |
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You make some good points guys. As long as the person making the donation (and their family) are aware of the museum policy, then no harm done.
Museums serve a purpose for the average person that wouldn't otherwise get to see items like inboard marine engines from many years ago. They wouldn't otherwise have a chance to see the private collections that are available to some.
There is also merit in donating, or selling at a very reasonable price, some of our more common engines to those young collectors who are just starting out. This feeds the hobby and keeps the next generation interested.
Just my $0.02. |
scott_n
Senior Member
Username: scott_n
Post Number: 141
Registered: 02-2008
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 - 11:28 am: |
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Guy my head just blue off my shoulders.
I cant speak fore others Museums but when we deaccession an item it is supposed to be afford to other non for profit museums first or educational institute's if that dos not work and the item is to be sold it has to be publicly announced to go to a public auction case in point our Hall Scott's we met the guide lines of an establish non fore profit museum. Not to mansion I was the first one to call about them. their can be a lot more to say but I am out of time Scott |
robert
Senior Member
Username: robert
Post Number: 345
Registered: 07-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 - 11:51 am: |
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I was going to say more about museums earlier but bit my tongue. Scott N's reply prompts me to say a little more. Where hand-on, interested people like Scott are involved and where a museum has the right management, there's nothing better. Unfortunately, few museums have hands-on people these days. From my observation, and from what I've been told by others, the larger, publicly funded museums are increasingly run by people for whom 'museum science' is just a career path. Artifacts these people tend to view with the casual attitude that you would expect of most people today when they "get something for nothing." Sad, but true. |
johnny
Senior Member
Username: johnny
Post Number: 244
Registered: 03-2006
| | Posted on Monday, February 08, 2010 - 07:54 am: |
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I have thought about this subject from time to time and here is what I have come up with. My dad has a large collection of stationary engines and I a collection of stationary and marine engines. No one else in the family seems to be interested in the old engines. So what will happen to them when we are gone. I hope in my old age before I pass on that I will get the chance to pass the engines on to other collectors. I am working on something in case I pass with out this option. I have a book where I keep information on all my engines. When I purchased them and how much I purchased them for. Also tells all the work and money that has been put into each engine. Even have receipts for a lot of stuff and bill of sales. I want to make a list of other collector friends and their contact info of who I think would be interested in my engines if I was to pass on. List would be made up from the Antique engine club I belong to and a few Internet forums I go on all the time. There would be some kind of instructions listed as to who gets offered what. |
sherlock
Member
Username: sherlock
Post Number: 29
Registered: 11-2008
| | Posted on Monday, February 08, 2010 - 02:09 pm: |
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Very interesting coments on what to do with your collections and here in the North West US, the Four of us have started a Preservation Group,..Mainly for the 2 Cycle Detroit GM Diesel, but also many different (1) One Cylinder Engines also. Mainly 1937 through the 40's WWll Engines, but also the 50's, new idea engines that GM Diesel made. One of us has a idea, to start our own Museum, in the Washington Pennisula town of Port Angeles and put all of our Collections in the Museum some day.
i hope we can do that some day soon! |
robert
Senior Member
Username: robert
Post Number: 346
Registered: 07-2003
| | Posted on Monday, February 08, 2010 - 09:28 pm: |
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Very wise to keep records, as Johnny does. We who are on the computer have no excuse for not doing that. I think I'll put something together this week. "What, when, where, who and how much" etc. The most important info we can record must be the history of each engine and its approximate value. A book or a computer file can get lost or forgotten, but a laminated sheet attached to each engine would be less likely to.
Sherlock, while Pt. Angeles would be more convenient for me, Pt. Townsend seems a more history-friendly place. On the other hand, I guess real estate is a lot cheaper in Sequim or Pt. Angeles! |
sherlock
Member
Username: sherlock
Post Number: 30
Registered: 11-2008
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 09, 2010 - 01:53 pm: |
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Robert,..Yes,...Port Townsend would be a good location also, but one of our Group people, with the most engines, lives in Port Angeles and there are some empty showroom buildings right across from the COHO Ferry to Victoria Landing and Saturday Markets, right downtown Port Angeles. I have also thought of checking with the Maritime Museum now at the South Shore of Lake Union, in Seattle. |
robert
Senior Member
Username: robert
Post Number: 348
Registered: 07-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 09, 2010 - 02:13 pm: |
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Sherlock, sounds like we ought to have a little cross border meet n greet some time. |
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