For those of you who do not know, I work in a museum and have to deal with all of the issues brought forward in the past posts. When I made my original post, I was not trying to say we most go out and buy the ring. I was trying to make a point about what you and I considered significant items with historical value and how that changes over time.
1) Just because the family does not find important or value the item does not mean it had a special value to the person who owned it. Family does not always agree with what is important in the lives of all their members. It is what was important to that person, not his family members that counts. A decade down the line, a document or memoir might come out talking about his relation with the masons that changes the importance of the historical value of the ring.
2) Time, space, and money- yes you are preaching to the choir. We have crap here that will never be used but is maintained because it relates in some shape or fashion to the person the museum is associated with. There are thousands of artifacts floating around the internet associated with this person that yes we would love to have but are mandated that we cannot purchase or the foundation lacks the funding to purchase if they desired to. That being said... a museum or archive either one has to be very careful about what it selects as an artifact or turns away. What might seem trivial and of no significance to you or I, may become important to some form of research 40 years down the road.
