Accessioning an item already owned by museum.

[L. James Hansmann]

We are relatively new, having opened as a museum in 1997 in an 1875 RR depot. We have our original guest sign in book dated from 1997 to 2009 and I would like to accession it.
Would it be a “Found in Collection” item or is there some other way to show how we acquired it?

[Ella Rayburn]

I would not consider it “found in collection” as that means it was part of the museum collection but without certain attributes of provience. It should be brought into your museum collection in what ever formal process your museum has. The donor is the museum, the date acquired is the date accepted into the collection. When your museum decides to add its business and operating records to the museum collection for perpetuity, the process will be the same. Hope this helped.

[L. James Hansmann]

Yes, thanks Ella. That makes perfect sense.

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