I come to this long thread very late in the game but I
desire to add my two cents.  In response to the post fom
"Hodcarry" who suggested that curators have lost some degree
of professional expertise as a result of "generic" museum
programs, I could not disagree more.

Using my own institution as an example, we have 35,000
artifacts in our collection which began in the attic of a
historical society member in 1961.  The objects collected
are diverse, and generally relate to the history of our
county from about 1872 to the present day.  Unfortunately,
like so many other "small" museums, we did not have a
professio curator until 1986.  Consequently, our records
before then are scant.  Compounding the dificulty is that
whenthe museum was moved to its present location, the
facility experienced a renaissance of sortsand the community
began donating objects at a rate beyond the capacity of the
staff to handle.

Today, our curator of collections struggles with reconciling
scant or non-existent accession records, sometimes poor
provenance information, and a host of other difficulties
including a storage area retro-fitted into a ninety year old
structure.

For all that (and I'm sure there are a great many curators
out there with similar stories), our curator has done a
fantastic job of organizing the collection, making it
accesible, studying unique pieces when possible, and
following any leads on provenance she has.  While I'm
certain that she would like to be continuing her studies
into her area of historical expertise, the demands of the
job do not allow it.

She may not know the difference between a match plane and a
jack plane, but I would certainly not trade her experience
and expertise for a curator who had so specialized an
expertise that the big picture would receive the sort of
attention it should.

In other words, at our facility, the issues of the forest
are far greater than the issue of a single tree.  What I am
driving at is that institutions are at variuous stages of
professional growth, and I'm willing to bet that there is
a far greater need for general knowledge among the majority
of the nation's museums than specialized knowledge.  I would
like to believe that someday our facility will have a
Curator of Agricultural Tools & Equipment, but that day is
many, many, years away.  Until then, however, we will keep
working and keep studying our collection in hopes that one
day we will be able to look at the smooth bore and the
rifled barrel and be able to tell you what caliber it is
without the benefit of the firearms manual.

In the meantime, should our curator's salary be determined
by the lack of "specialized knowledge" Hodcarry mourns?  No,
and hell no!!!!! We're doing the best we can, and we're
doing a very good job of correcting 36 years of curatorial
difficulties.  Just my two cents (or maybe that rant was
worth a dime.)

Jay Smith
Executive Director
Reno County Museum
Hutchinson, Kansas
--usual disclaimers apply--