Museum turned down gift

Retired watchmaker David Smith thought his offer of antique tools and a collection of 300 musical wind instruments to Auckland War Memorial Museum would ensure they would be safe and available for public display for future generations.

However, the 80-year-old Aucklander said he was shocked when the gift of "small but beautifully made" tools was rejected. He is now reconsidering his will, in which he has left the museum his musical collection.

The tools were an addition to those already given to the museum by the Horological Institute and which were previously in a fine exhibition with the George Bolt Clock Collection.

Mr Smith said that soon after museum director Dr Vanda Vitali took over, she placed a moratorium on new acquisitions, which is still going 18 months later. He had built over many years a collection of musical wind instruments which, with the museum's Castle Collection, would make the major collection in its field for the Southern Hemisphere.

"But with all the political in-fighting and the trying to turn the museum into Disneyland, I'm reconsidering," he said.

"If the public starts to worry or the museum gets a reputation for being picky and choosy, people are not going to think of the museum when they dispose of their treasures. They will flog them off on eBay and they will be lost to the country."