Page:The museum, (Jackson, Marget Talbot, 1917).djvu/254

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THE MUSEUM

already employed in another capacity, or unless the museum has so much of this work that it requires a photographer constantly in attendance. It is often convenient, too, to have some one take pictures of transient exhibitions for use in the newspapers. The same person can make the photographic postcards, and should have a camera of 8×10 size to use in making prints for sale if the museum is fortunate in owning anything that reproduces well and has a popular appeal. The small prints for accession cards can be made with the same camera by using a system of shutters to cover parts of the plate such as is in use in the shops where penny pictures are taken.

RECORDS

The needs of each museum in respect to blanks are wholly individual and must be met by the ingenuity of the director or by the aid of an expert efficiency man, although the latter never thoroughly understands the peculiar problems of the museum. The system developed by the Metropolitan is fitted to an enormous institution but is too cumbersome to be useful, without modification, in a smaller museum. The Boston system has a number of good points but again is not wholly satisfactory. Both of these institutions send out information carefully tabulated and