With more than forty-five years in the museum field as a curator, director, consultant, museum studies educator, writer, and trustee, I have noticed that, in spite of a professed concern for the preservation of their collections, and in spite of the shock expressed when collections are lost to disastrous human or natural actions, museums are more than willing to engage in purposeful destruction of their collections.
Museums consciously trash things expected to be held in perpetuity for the public good by deaccessioning items without requiring preservation caveats of the next owner. This largely happens when museums sell items on the open market. To be sure, the vast majority of museum collections are secure for the moment. But as more and more institutions are overwhelmed by their expanding collections, and the cost of maintaining those collections, museum holdings will contract.
I have been fortunate enough that collection loss by outside forces in the museums where I have been a curator or director has not occurred (with the exception of a very large ship model on loan to another museum years ago). Yet I have caused depletion by my own overt and approved actions on the job when I have deaccessioned things commercially on the open market without restrictions.
Normally museums devote considerable resources to protecting their art, historic artifacts, and scientific specimens. Tens of thousands are employed in various museum jobs to help assure the retention of collections. These positions include curators, conservators, directors, collection managers,
