David Bean rightly pointed out that museums will likely just sell a bike
that comes their way unless it has some special significance related to the
museum's special mission or thrust. Museums are constantly deaccessioning
items they don't need or that no longer fit with their goals. Most larger
museums only display a small portion of their items...often as little as
10%. The remainder is usually stored in an annex.
The longer an item sets in their storage the more at risk it is. Normal
problems with aging and environment are combined with such other problems as
fire, theft, etc. Don't think that the threat of theft is insignificant. A
nearby museum has had a collection of very special pocket watches
decimated...a few were recovered, but I never heard of anyone being
prosecuted. They also had the special collection of a famous and wealthy
Automotive Pioneer's wife's Indian baskets just fade away. She collected
many of these from the sources in the period shortly after 1900, going to
the original sources to see them made and then purchased them. I remember
seeing them on the shelves of the museum annex 35 years or so ago and being
stunned that they had never been exhibited on the museum floor. They were
in every way the equal of anything I had ever seen in books or magazines.
Color and condition were superb. My impression was of 30-40 or more of them
in my memory. A few years ago I saw them again and there were well less than
ten left. I asked what had happened to them and a low ranking person there
told me that was all there had ever been as well as she could recall. I was
then rushed off in another direction.
Unless it was something like the Smithsonian or a museum whose existence was
specifically as a bike or transportation museum, I would not leave bikes to
them. In the event one does, it is possible to forge an agreement so that
if the item were no longer wanted it would revert to your heirs...much like
folks sometimes do when donating park land to a city.
Best to give them away so you can enjoy folks enjoying them or sell to aid
your estate, as Lou Deeter suggests.
Tom Sanders
Lansing, Mi USA