Is this any way to run a museum? Very much so today.

At two rail museums where I work as a vounteer, one on each coast, railfans and enthusiats make up well under 10% of visitors. Identifying fans can be difficult. They range from the ardent foamer with railroad patches all over his shirt to the man who owned a Lionel train as a kid and who has always thought railroads were neat.

In many museums today enthusiasts tickets won't even pay the electric power bill. If the museum does not attract the general public, it is destined eventually to fail and close. Even if tax dollars help support the museum, they will dry up if the politicians decide that few voters are attending that museum.

Many rail museums started as an old boys club. It's sad that the museum must turn away from the old boys who started it. However today rail museum must look elsewhere for support. That means family groups with kids.

One shortcoming that I notce in some museums is failure to look at the museum and collection from the viewpoint of the typical visitor. Limited museum resources should be allocated to things that would interets a typical visitor. To the enthusiast it may be important that the museum is restoring a rare type of diesel locomotive when it already has five other similar locomotives on display. However the public would find a restored Pullman car more interesting so visitors could see how people were able to sleep on trains on long distance trips.