Reading List: Developing Successful Grants: How to Turn Your Ideas into Reality

Awww, the good old days of the early 2000s :D 

In my defense, I just discovered this book this month, so this isn't one of those that I've had on my to-read bookshelf so long it's gone out of date while waiting for me to read it.

This is an insightful analysis of the process of writing grants, with lots of good ideas of how to go about the process, from first knowing what you need to fund then to finding grants, writing the application, using a Common Grant Application, preparing your budget, on and on. 

The book was written in 2005, so reading it in 2026 there are quite a few "tips" that are now outdated (like saving your documents to a zip disk, going to your local magazine store to purchase a phone list, and not submitting electronically); however, overall the advice and process is still relevant and helps you avoid pitfalls. 

The Upsides:

• Start with taking an inventory of your needs - program needs, equipment, etc. Once you know those things, then you can begin looking for funding. 
• They lay out the process in really easy to understand steps.
• There is lots of advice and quite a few samples (samples of how to format goals vs. objectives in a table, samples of breaking text into bullet points to be visually appealing, advice on using emotional language, etc.).
• They explain how to make the general layout they recommend match a funder's RFP or required layout.
• They include what items/aspects you should include in your application, even if the funder doesn't ask for it.

The Downsides:

• The age of the book. There were quite a few things that I thought, "Ooh! I didn't know about that. Let me go look it up," only to find a website that is for sale instead of having whatever it had in 2005, or the aforementioned tip of getting a list of funders at your local reputable magazine store. (There were also a number of suggested websites that I remember from long ago, felt nostalgic when reading about them, then was sad to visit their website and realize they don't exist anymore or not in the same way they used to.)
  
• One thing they repeatedly highlight is having a group to work on grant applications, including people familiar with the program(s) being funded, a proofreader, a writer, someone to compile everything, community supporters, ... These are great ideas and would certainly help a grantwriter feel less pressured and stressed, but let's be real - how likely is it a small organization is going to have that many people available to help with a grant? Even if you recruit members of your community for some of these positions, you're still not likely to have this grand Team they recommend. But it's a nice ideal.
  
  

Overall: This is a really great look at the process of writing grants, and despite the age of it, it's still very informative and useful. I recommend this to people working on finding funding and preparing grant applications, especially people who are new to the role.  

 

Developing Successful Grants: How to Turn Your Ideas into Reality, 2005

Mike DuBose, Martha Davis, Anne Black, and Research Associates

230 pages

Reading List: Things Great and Small: Collections Management Policies (2nd ed)

Sometimes I'm so ashamed by how long books sit on my bookshelf before I read them. I see them in the store or online, I get really excited, I buy them, and then... I just don't have time to read them. I bought this book when it was new (2018) but didn't read it until this month. Yikes! At least nothing's too outdated yet!

This is a nice overview of collections management policies - different types of policies you should have, what you should take into account, why to have policies, who should be involved in writing or approving different policies, all that good stuff. It also includes topics like risk management, intellectual property, and ethics.

If you've read a lot about collections, collections management, and policies, there's nothing really new in here; but this is a great synopsis of collections management policies if you haven't read a bunch others, or a nice one-stop-shop of all the good stuff to get you going.

Plus, John Simmons is funny. If you're on any collections e-lists with him, you likely know his December holiday-themed/museum-management-themed poems. (I was disappointed, though, that the funny wasn't strong throughout. He starts off well, with sample policies from the House of Victoriana, the Institute of Contrafactual Science, and the Museum of Mediocre Art, but then some of their sample policies are just like regular sample policies and the funny is gone.)

 

The upsides:

• A nice one-stop-shop of all the good stuff to get you going on your Collections Management policies
  
• Good for newcomers to the Collections Management game
  

The downsides:

• If you have other books about Collections Management, you might not need this.
• There are a number of "When Policy Meets Reality" call-out boxes scattered throughout the book, but a lot of them seem irrelevant. They're funny or interesting or astounding, but they're not always helpful. If you try hard, you might force yourself to stop and think about what you would do if you were in that situation, but there's not a lot of insight offered. And others just make you think "Huh, that's... interesting" and you move on. It's some wasted space that could have either been used for more helpful info, or could have just been cut and made the book a bit smaller. Similarly, a lot of the images seem unnecessary, and removing them could have made the book smaller. (I keep saying "smaller" because it's a tall and wide book - 11" H x 8.5+" W)
  

  

Overall: This is definitely worth a read, unless you Absolutely Know Everything about collections management and policies. Even if you think you know a lot, you still might get some new insights. Or you might gain a new favorite reference book.

 

Things Great and Small: Collections Management Policies, 2nd edition, 2018

John E. Simmons

220 pages (and it's a tall and wide book, too), including references/bibliography/other reading, and appendices with AAM's Code of Ethics, AAM's Accreditation Commission's Standards Regarding Collections Stewardship, various laws and regulations that affect collections

Reading List: Getting Caught Up

Hey, I read a museum-related book! Lookatme! (Yikes). I'm trying to make more of an effort to read museum- or nonprofit-related books again (Didn't I say that before, too?), and this year I've read five already! ... Okay, some of it has been because it's been painfully slow for me at work lately, and I've had to create projects to keep myself occupied. One of those was finally reading a bunch of books our old Executive Director gave my then-manager when she retired and cleared out her office. My then-manager gave the books to me to store for our department, and now that I've had NOTHING to do, I decided it was finally time to read them!

Book #1 was The AAA Way to Fundraising Success: Maximum Involvement, Maximum Results, which I really learned about in a webcast I watched (DonorPerfect Community Conference 2025, Robbe Healey "Stay the Course: Individual Giving Tactics for Changing Times"). The book sounded useful, and the cover the presenter showed started to seem really familiar... and then I realized it was because it was one of the books our Director had given us that I'd been wanting to read! So I dove into it.

The book is super short but super useful. It helps you think about how to structure your organization's culture of philanthropy and how everyone can be involved. It's specifically focused on getting your board involved in cultivating donors and partnerships, but it can be applied to anyone. 

Kay Sprinkel Grace says there are 3 types of people needed: Ambassadors and Advocates to talk up your cause, make connections, and lay the groundwork, then the Askers who do the actual asking for a donation. She describes the function of each of the roles and explains what personal traits make for a good fit for that role, and also gives ideas of how the different roles interact and work together.

This was such a fantastic way to show that fundraising isn't only about asking for money; it's about getting the word out and building relationships, too. And we can all play a part in that. Someone may not feel comfortable asking someone for $$$, but can talk up the cause they believe in.

Book #2 was Asking: A 59-Minute Guide to Everything Board Members, Volunteers, and Staff Must Know to Secure the Gift, by Jerold Panas. This was a quick, easy-to-read reference book, yet it felt like it was giving you everything you need to know. He lays out the cultivation and solicitation process step-by-step, from identifying potential donors to writing an introductory letter (I'm not sure how much of that is still relevant today) and making an introductory phone call to having a first conversation (but not asking for money yet) on through to the Ask and follow up. Panas gives great tips, makes it all seem really easy, and even gives advice for when the donor says no or when you only think they've said no. Like The AAA Way to Fundraising Success, this would make a great reference book to have handy to keep fundraisers on track and motivated.

I'll mention book #3 for the year quickly because while it wasn't exactly useful, it was fun to read: The Principles Of Museum Administration, George Brown Goode's 1895-ish treatise of the workings of museums (reprint purchased on Amazon). It was really interesting to read as a historical record of how early museums in the U.S. were perceived and run, and how much of what he wrote is still relevant today!

I originally hadn't planned on writing about The Principles of Museum Administration because it was so short, and hadn't even thought about writing about the fundraising ones, in part because I've been reading them at work (different environment, so I didn't make the mental connection between reading and blogging) and in part because they're not museum-related. However, museums obviously need to fundraise, so even though these books aren't about collections or exhibits or other museum-specific areas, they are relevant to museums. 

So there you go! Museum- and nonprofit-related books I've been reading in 2026. I've got two more that I've finished reading recently, so stay tuned for those reviews!

I'm Still Here!

 Hi again!

I realized it's been a little while since I'd posted here, so I popped on over to see what the last thing I wrote was... AND IT WAS FROM JULY, 2023! 

When we last talked (or I last wrote, and hoped you were reading), I was posting about museum books I was reading and about some unidentifiable photos I found from my grandfather's time in the Air Force. I had plenty of time to read, and research, and write about what I was reading and researching because I didn't have a job.

But then I got a job! Woo!  It's not related to the history field or museum activities that I read about, but it is in a museum/nonprofit, so I'm kind of close to the sector I was hoping to be in. 

This doesn't give me a lot of time to read many, many museum books (or any books) and write reviews, though, and I've fallen behind on my research on my grandfather's history. Plus, I started going down the rabbit hole of USAF research: in order to know when and where some of his photos might have been taken, I decided I needed a better idea of where he was stationed and when. I went through my old files and dates that I'd gotten from my mother years ago, but decided they weren't detailed enough, so I went through ALLLLLLLL of her files again, made way more notes, started to put together a better timeline.  ... And then I realized there were a bunch of phrases and abbreviations in his paperwork that I didn't understand, and Air Force bases I didn't know, so then that became another layer of research.  So while I haven't found any new leads or concrete answers on those photos or any of the other photos I found while going through my mom's genealogy files for the hundredth time, I'm attempting to broaden my knowledge of the military, specifically the Army Air Corps / Army Air Forces / Air Force in the 1940s. 

One cool thing I did find was a yearbook from my grandfather's Training School at Mather Field from 1942. Similar to your high school yearbook, it gave an overview of the campus, talked about activities the incoming cadets had to go through (think about your Freshman orientation), classes and training that the different ranks went through, and had pictures of these classes and the individual servicemembers (!). There's my grandfather, age 20-ish, a young man just starting his career! Oh my goodness!!

The few times I get to spend time researching my grandfather's career, it is in the back of my mind of how I could articulate it in a blog post, so I do still think about you! And the few museum books I've read since July 2023 haven't been super awesome and worth going back to review -- either good or bad -- but I did kind of forget that I'd been reviewing them (Sorry). So that said, I do still think about you, I just didn't realize it had been so long since I posted, and I don't have the same kind of time that I used to have to spend reading or researching things that are worth writing about :(  But I do still exist, am still trying to research those photos and my grandfather's military career, and I am still reading (when I can) books about different aspects of museums. I'm still here!

Reading List: Registration Methods for the Small Museum

Well... I just don't have much to say about this one. I usually have lots to say about nearly every book I read, but this just wasn't one of them. And I don't know why. 

It's a fine enough overview of registration needs, methods, policies, forms, etc. It's the kind of thing you could give to someone NEW to collections and registration (a new volunteer, or someone running a museum starting their Collections department, including procedures and policies, from scratch), and it would give them the very basic knowledge about why we do things and how to go about doing them. But it was dry at times (most of the time?), and just... so basic and factual that there was no pizzaz or pah! to the book. It was just "Here it is. Just the facts, ma'am." Even the author's first-hand anecdotes were just blah.

The upsides:

• It has the very basic info, including the What, Why, and How. 
• Sample forms and policies
• It has a good chapter on using computers for your collections - what to look for in software, security, hardware, and networking. Again, just basics, but enough ideas to get you started.

The downsides:

• It felt boring. I mean, okay, maybe some people wouldn't find this kind of thing interesting or exciting in the first place, but you and I do, right? That's why we're here, writing and reading this blog post. So for *me* to say "Eh, it's dry" says something.

Overall:

I feel like there are other books covering the same info, and more in-depth, but if you just want a Basic "How and why we do this," this would work. And that type of book absolutely has a place and an audience, but if you've been doing this for a while, or want something less snoozy, maybe look for another book. I'd still give it 2.5 or 3 stars out of 5, though: a nice middle-of-the-road, did-what-it-came-here-to-do rating.

Because I feel like I'm so down on the book and not doing a good job of explaining its value, here's the Table of Contents, so you can see that it *does* cover useful topics:

1. Why Have a Museum Registration System?
2. Acquisition
3. The Accession Number
4. Accessioning
5. Documentation
6. The Catalog
7. Loans
8. A World of Computers

and then sample forms and policies.

Registration Methods for the Small Museum, 2018

Daniel B. Reibel, updated by Deborah Rose Van Horn

105 big pages of text, 33 pages of samples, and a bibliography

Reading List: Recording Oral History: A Guide for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Third Edition

One of my favorite types of projects for museums is transcribing oral histories and interviewing people about their lives. Mostly I do transcription, but for a while I was also interviewing a certain group of people. Between hearing over and over one particular interviewer whose style I didn't particularly care for, and wanting to maybe do more interviews myself (while not wanting to sound like the interviewer whose style I didn't care for), I decided to expand my library to include books about oral histories. 

Valerie Raleigh Yow's book is a really great overview of oral histories, and possibly answers every question you might have about preparing for an interview, conducting the interview, what to do after the interview, and how to use the quotes and information you get. 

Yow starts at the very beginning of the history of oral interviews and passing down information orally, which made it seem like the book was going to be dry and boring. (A good portion of each chapter is bibliography/other reading and notes/citations, which also made it seem like the book was going to be super long. This is a good-sized book, but when you take into account how much of it is reference material, it's much less daunting.) But then she gets into what we really came here for. 

Yow starts at the beginning of the interviewing process: asking what the purpose of your project is, who you need to talk to, what you want to ask them about, and whether they can give you names of other people to talk about. (You thought the beginning of the interviewing process was when you showed up at the interviewee's house? Wrong!) She also discusses interviewing techniques and strategies, legal issues and ethics, fact-checking, and getting a range of voices for your project.

Other chapters include topics like how to choose a recorder, work-for-hire (ethics, warnings, scope of work), chapters for those specifically doing family histories or community (not necessarily geographic) histories, and where to store your final product (accessible archives!).

The upsides:

• Yow covers everything about an oral history project, from figuring out who to talk to, how to get additional people to talk to you, how to act around the interviewee, having an informal meeting with the interviewee to get to know each other before the real interview, cultural differences, ethics, having the interviewee read the transcript or your finished product, how to choose your audio recorder, transcribing, finding a repository, ... everything from your first "I have to do an interview" to your very final "It's done, has been used, and has been stored somewhere safe but accessible."
• The bibliography and suggested reading at the end of each chapter. Yow breaks them down by topic, and tells why each resource is a good resource. 
• Sample forms, questionnaires, and instructions.

The downsides:

• Since Yow is writing for different audiences (the family historian, the public historian, the work-for-hire for a company project, etc.), she sometimes repeats information from other chapters. If you're reading the book straight through, you'll start to feel the repetition. But if you're only reading chapters that are relevant to your type of project, this is actually an upside: no matter why you're reading the book, you're going to get all the information you need.

Overall:

This is a great one-stop reference for all aspects of an oral history project. If you're spearheading an oral history project or the only one involved in one -- for a museum, community, school, or company -- I'd recommend reading this whole book; if you have others helping you, such as students or volunteers who will be less involved in the whole process, I'd recommend giving them portions to read, but not necessarily the whole thing. There's definitely something for everyone involved in an oral history/interviewing project! 

Recording Oral History: A Guide for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Third Edition, 2015

Valerie Raleigh Yow

406 pages, including sample documents and recommended reading

Reading List: Museums 101 by Mark Walhimer

"101" usually implies a basic-level introduction to a subject: Sociology 101, Math 101, etc. Reviewers on Goodreads also refer to this as an introduction, either for themselves or for their students, and I came across it as a book being used in a Museums Studies class. As a very basic introduction to museums and museum management, this book is fine.

But, if you know nearly anything about museums, this book is not really for you, unless you just want it to skim, or maybe get a few ideas, or to have on hand to give to someone who is new to museums. If you've been around museums, you're not really going to get much out of this.*

And if you're new to museums, I don't think I'd recommend reading this unless you're reading it for a class and have a teacher to walk you through it. There are places where Walhimer doesn't really explain jargon he uses; there are places with mistakes (he refers to a 503(c)(3). I googled 503 instead of 501 in case a 503 is a less-common tax status that I have never heard of, and every result was for 501(c)(3)s. A museum newbie without a guide might be confused); and through the majority of the book, I felt like I was putting things together on my own, based on my experience, rather than him doing a good job of explaining them, their connections, or their relevance. 

* That said, there are some things I found interesting or things I didn't know or things to keep in mind for the future. But overall, eh. 

The upsides:

• This covers a little of everything involved in museums: where to put your museum, creating exhibits, collections access, building an integrated atmosphere, ... on and on. 
• Early chapters have "Next steps" at the end of the chapters (such as organizations to look up or a suggestion to visit a museum in your area). These are cool for those just getting into museums; I wish he'd continue them after those first few chapters, though. They can get your brain jogging on things to do or other institutions to visit for ideas. Granted, he includes a lot of examples of museums in most of his chapters, so you could figure out on your own what the "next steps" should be to research a topic further, but I wish he'd continued it for consistency and for that extra push of "No, really. I'm not just blowing smoke in the chapter when I name-checked that museum. Look them up!" (especially because a number of times it felt like it was name-checking of how great he is, or just how many different museums he could list).
• Short chapters - he gives you only the very basic information.
• He provides resources, sample documents, and additional reading. (The additional reading can come in handy for anyone who wishes that maybe this were Museums 102 or 103, and not 101.)
• There's a website associated with the book where you can download the above resources (rather than just looking at the not-so-great-quality scan that's in the book) as well as some not included in the book.

The downsides:

• Typos and mistakes! Some are little (quite a few times of missing words), some are ones that you can figure out but are still annoying (he refers to Telsa Motors and Telsa Museum in a paragraph; like the 503(c)(3), I googled these just in case there's something I'm unaware of, but no, every result was actually for Tesla), some are bigger but not relevant (Bill Gates wasn't the founder of Microsoft; he was the co-founder; but if I can't trust you to get that right, what else are you getting wrong? [see also Telsa and 503(c)(3)]), and some are more important, like claiming your organization can be a 503(c)(3). 
• There are times -- especially when talking about finances -- that I think he's trying to give the reader a realistic picture of what it takes to plan and run a museum, but it comes across more as "Do not do this! You can't do this!" 
• The index isn't very helpful. I found myself writing in a number of topics (like endowments), and although he mentions mission statements a few times, it's not listed in the index. He says in the introduction that you can either read the whole book, or just the chapter(s) related to your questions, but when topics like mission statement are scattered throughout, including in a chapter about a museum's physical building (!), but not in the index (!), you basically have to read the whole book to answer your question about mission statements. 
• Some of the organization felt odd. Not only does he talk about mission statements in the chapter about the museum's building, but he also talks about background checks for board members in the chapter about collections care. I do see how these can be linked (your building should represent the museum's mission and tone; you want to be able to trust your board members with your collections [and finances]), but why aren't these in their own chapters? Or with a better index so you know to read the chapter about buildings if you want stuff about mission statements and the chapter on collections so you know to give your board members a background check! 
• I didn't understand some of his charts and references.
• Short chapters - in most cases, he only gives you the very basic information.

Overall:

Eh. It can't hurt for seasoned professionals to read this. It does include topics like building a culture at your organization, both an internal culture and with your audience; museum feasibility studies; project management; and a questionnaire to give artifact donors. So yeah, there's probably a chance even people who work in museums will find something new or memorable in the book.

For people new to the museum field, there are other books you can read. This does have the benefit of being sort of a one-stop-shop for very basic information about running a museum, but I don't know how useful it would really be to anyone starting out in the industry, since you'll find most of this information elsewhere and the book's writing and organization seem scattered. 

The writing also felt outdated, even though it's from 2015 and does include current topics like sustainability. Other places felt like he was writing about the old way of thinking of museums, though, like pay, treatment of employees, things like that. 

If you know about museums already, don't waste your money buying this. If you really want to have it as a resource, look for it at a used bookstore or someone cleaning out their library. 

If you don't know about museums already... there are other places to find enough of this information that I would suggest you not waste your money, either. Check it out from a library, instead! 

Museums 101, 2015

Mark Walhimer

160 pages of text, 50 pages of sample documents (14 documents), approximately 5 pages of Bibliography