The kiowa tribal museum, operated by the kiowa tribe of oklahoma, will support the preservation of its current and future collections by implementing professional collections management procedures…

The Institute of Museum and Library Services awarded the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma $536,012 on September 1, 2026, under the Museums for America program (CFDA 45.301) to implement professional collections management procedures at the Kiowa Tribal Museum in Carnegie, Oklahoma.

The Kiowa Tribe will hire a registrar to lead the project with support from an external conservation consultant. Work includes conducting an item-level inventory, preparing object condition reports, and applying archival-safe barcodes to museum holdings. Tribal elders will serve as advisors, providing linguistic, historical, and cultural context for collections. The tribe will replace existing storage materials with archival supplies, purchase and install high-density shelving to reduce overcrowding and improve organization, and acquire collections management software to link digital images to catalog records.

Performance runs through August 31, 2029.

The kiowa tribal museum, operated by the kiowa tribe of oklahoma, will support the preservation of its current and future collections by implementing professional collections management procedures in its museum. The tribe will hire a registrar to lead the project with the assistance of an external conservation consultant. The project will begin with an item-level inventory, object condition reports, and tagging with archival-safe barcodes. Tribal elders will serve as advisors, providing linguistic, historical, and cultural insights about collections. Additional project activities will include replacing existing storage materials with archival supplies and purchasing and installing high-density shelving to reduce overcrowding and improve organization. The tribe will also purchase collections management software and initiate the linking of digital images to catalog records.