Donations
One of our weekly tasks in East Lothian’s museums is to count and bank donations. The cash in the box actually provides a good measure of how we’re doing but it sometimes also provides a snapshot of where our visitors come from. At John Muir Birthplace we always find American coins and bills in the box, as well as a wide variety of Euro coins (replacing all the francs, deutschmarks and so on from a few years ago). Aussie, Canadian and other coins still appear - it’s always interesting to see what does turn up.
There was a particular suprise just the other day - a little bag containing £1 in old 10p (2/-) and 5p (1/-) coins. At first sight completely useless and just a hassle but rest assured, they’ll find a use! It was in fact a dead handy donation as we spent a good while rumaging around last year trying to find just these items for our handling boxes….