Ten Steps to Starting A Private Museum

C.O. Polk Interactive Museum, created by Museum Planning, LLC

Download PDF of Ten Steps to Create a Private Museum

Introduction

I just got off the phone with a woman who lives in New Mexico. She is seventy-eight years old, with no children, and is in the process of her estate planning. She has decided that she would like to use her estate to create a museum / arts center to give back to the community she loves.

I’m fifty-seven years old. I grew up in Woodbridge, Connecticut, where we had a local library and a community center. The community center had activities for preteens and teenagers, and a nursery school. Almost every afternoon or evening, I would go to the community center, and there would be something to do: I could take art classes, or play ping pong and board games with other kids my age. It was a charming way to grow up.

It seems that those days are gone. Cities are cutting back on activities for teens and preteens, and are trimming Parks and Recreation budgets. However, the woman in Arizona wanted to shore up her community. I’m sure there are thousands of people in the United States in a similar situation, who could give back to their local community with gifts of a million dollars and above.

I told the woman during the phone call that the best use of her funding would be to create arts programming for preteens, teens, young…