In article <[log in to unmask]>, Katherine Baker <[log in to unmask]> wrote: >There is a museum in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina dedicated to the >Wright Brothers first flight. I agree that this collection should not STAY in private hands. I agree with many of the poins made by E. J. Pershey. But I will not apologize for RESCUING these archives. I have been employed full-time or self-employed full-time for the past twenty-five years as an aviation museum supplier, consultant, and/or curator and executive director. My major accomplishment was establishing a recognized tax-exempt public museum featuring one of the best collections/exhibits of pre-WWII aero engines in the world. (THE RACEWAY COLLECTION; 175 engines; 48 WWI and earlier and 19 being the only known examples) I also collected the largest collection of WWI German and Austro-Hungarian aircraft parts and instruments, along with a number of unique or extremely rare aeroplanes over those twenty five years.They were all publicly accessable and information was provided to all who needed it. When I was contacted by the previous ownere of these archives, they had sat in file cabinets for nearly forty years in his basement and he was on the verge of breaking them up to sell the most historic documents to autograph dealers and the photo collection at airshows for $5 per photo. His own words were, "You wouldn't believe how many pick-up loads (of The Curtiss Wright Co archives) I took to the dump." Fortunately, he was fascinated by the early material and his basement was bone dry and his four file cabinets were full of folders pressed tightly together. When major dealers such as those with full page ads like Profiles In History, are selling single Lindbergh letters @ $25,000 and Sotheby auctions are fetching $7,000-$12,000 for signed Wright letters in the Kallir auction and even a ten page report from cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin is hammered for over $100,000, What is a signed and personal wax sealed contract forming The Wright Company by Wilbur and Orville worth? What are 850 pages of unpublished Wright Co. letters worth? What are the executive board minutes, ledgers, and ten crates of historic documents worth. Wealthy collectors have been fighting over them, without let-up. The Cody Archive sale in London brought some bids that were five to ten times the high estimates for personal and business documents! I am willing to negotiate and compromise my families stake in these archives to see them go to a proper institution who will preserve them and provide public access. They cost me a fortune and two years of exasperating and frustrating negotiations. I can appreciate your concern. I appreciate, very much the help I have received from subscribers to this list. Until recently I was executive director at Ryder's Fighter Museum when the owner and wife and son were killed in a plane crash. This association cost me several hundred thousand dollars and the virtual destruction of my life-long collection. Cheers, J.Gertler