Sports Museum Creditors Asking Artifact Donors to Pay to Get Their Stuff Back
When we reported back in February about the closing of the Sports Museum (the one in New York, not the other one in Los Angeles, which closed just a month later), the whole story basically boiled down to what usually kills a business, educational or otherwise: they weren’t getting enough visitors and their money had run out. Interesting and newsworthy, sure, but not really the most thrilling story we’ve ever talked about. But now that the museum has entered into bankruptcy and are in the process of liquidating, things have taken a turn for the bizarre. The NY Times reports that the creditors have asked that the people who gave the museum its artifacts, such as the Heisman Trophy, should now pay a fee to have their items stored and ultimately returned, to the tune of around $250 per object. They claim it’s a legitimate fee that comes with things like storage and insurance, but of course, this isn’t sitting so well with the people who gave their goods and now want them back:
“To think that these athletes, who, out of the goodness of their hearts, loaned at no cost to the museum their precious artifacts, and to expect them to pay to get them back, is outrageous,” said Marj Snyder, the chief program and planning officer of the Women’s Sports Foundation.
