Looking for an A-Z, one-stop, comprehensive book on museums? Wish you were able to have one of the world’s leading museum consultants spend a couple of days with you, talking you through how to start a museum, how museums work, how to set up an exhibit, and more? If so, Museums 101 is the answer to your wishes.

In one short volume, Mark Walhimer covers:
• Essential Background, such as what is a museum, a quick history of museums, and 10 steps to starting a museum
• Operational Basics, such as branding, marketing, strategic planning, governance, accessibility, and day-to-day operations
• What goes on behind the scenes in a museum, ranging from finances to fundraising to art handling, exhibit management, and research
• The Visitor Experience, planning a museum, designing exhibits for visitors, programming, and exhibit evaluation.

Features that even the most experienced museum professionals will find useful include a community outreach checklist, a fundraising checklist, a questionnaire for people considering starting a new museum, and an exhaustive, well-organized list of online resources for museum operations. The book’s contents were overseen by a six-member international advisory board.

Valuable appendixes you’ll use every day include a museum toolbox full of useful forms, checklists, and worksheets, and a glossary of essential museum-related terms. In addition to the printed book, Museums 101 also features a companion website exclusively for readers of the book. The website— museums101.com—features:

• links to essential online resources in the museum world,
• downloadable sample documents,
• a glossary,
• a bibliography of sources for further reading, and
• photographs of more than 75 museums of all types.


Museums 101 Advisory Board
• Jim DeMersman, Executive Director, Museum on Main, Pleasanton, California,
United States of America
• David L. Godfrey, C.P.A., Allison & Godfrey, Certified Public Accountants,
Norwalk, Connecticut, United States of America
• Van A. Romans, President, Fort Worth Museum of Science and History,
Fort Worth, Texas, and Board of Trustees, American Alliance of Museums,
United States of America
• Sergey Solovyev, Ph.D., Department of Greek & Roman Antiquities, The
State Hermitage Museum, Russia
• Alison Spence, Exhibitions and Loans Registrar, National Museum of Australia,
Canberra ACT, Australia
• Audrey Vermette, Director of Programs and Public Affairs, Canadian Museums
Association, Ontario, Canada

Acknowledgments
Preface
Foreword

PART I: ESSENTIAL MUSEUM BACKGROUND
Chapter 1: Defining a Museum
Chapter 2: A Quick History of Museums

PART II: CREATING AN INTEGRATED MUSEUM
Chapter 3: The Integrated Museum
Chapter 4: Starting a Museum
Chapter 5: Museum Governance
Chapter 6: Museum Feasibility Studies
Chapter 7: Museum Planning Strategies

PART III: EXHIBITIONS
Chapter 8: Collections
Chapter 9: The Museum Building
Chapter 10: Museum Exhibition Development/Curation
Chapter 11: Exhibition Design and Fabrication
Chapter 12: Museum Programming: Education

PART IV: BEHIND THE SCENES
Chapter 13: Museum Finances
Chapter 14: Museum Fundraising
Chapter 15: Museum Marketing
Chapter 16: Museum Project Management
Chapter 17: Museum Evaluation
Chapter 18: Museum Operations
Chapter 19: Museum Accessibility
Chapter 20: Museum Research
Chapter 21: Collections Care
Chapter 22: The Museum of the Future
Chapter 23: Putting Your Museum Online
Chapter 24: Working in Museums

PART V: THE MUSEUM TOOLBOX
American Alliance of Museums: Code of Ethics for Museums
Sample Bylaws
American Alliance of Museums: Developing a Mission Statement
Sample Museum Constitution
Sample Museum Feasibility Template
Sample Board Member Responsibilities
Sample Policy for Donations of Objects
Sample Donor Questionnaire
Sample Museum Exhibit Sponsorship Agreement
Timing and Tracking Study
Visitor Exit Interview
Museum Job Descriptions
Sample Museum Director Job Description
Object Cataloging Record
Museum Exhibition Design Process

Resources
Bibliography
Index