SILOAM SPRINGS — History museums are full of old things and are dedicated to preserving and educating others about the past. This includes activities such as historical research, educational programs and collecting, cataloging and displaying historic artifacts.

It seems odd at first glance that an institution firmly focused on the past would use high-tech communications tools of the present. Yet, that is exactly what the Siloam Springs Museum has chosen to do in launching its own e-list. The “e” stands for electronic.

An e-list is an automated subscription service that sends you e-mails that relate to a particular topic or organization. Subscribers need to confirm that they wish to subscribe to the elist and can cancel their subscription, should they choose to, with one click.

The Siloam Springs Museum e-list coordinator is Cynthia Lee, who is also the museum’s community outreach coordinator. She points out that, “Nonprofit organizations, like for-profit businesses, are adopting a new generation of hightech communication tools.

These go well beyond simply having a Web site and email account. That was 20th century high-tech communications.

“In the 21st century, nonprofits are scrambling to use blogs, e-lists, podcasts, audio links, YouTube videos and social networking organizations - such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Ning - which lets you create your own social network free of charge.

“More and more people are using e-mail and the Internet, both at work and athome,” Lee said. “I know that I find it very helpful to read e-mails to learn about, or be reminded about, upcoming events of interest. It saves me time because I don’t have to scrounge around in piles of papers and magazines to locate the hard-copy newsletter with that information. In a perfect world, we would all immediately write notes on our calendars or in our Daytimers when we read about an interesting program or event in a newspaper or newsletter, but this is not the norm.”

The museum’s e-list is free of charge and can be joined by visiting the Web site, http://tinyurl.com/pzywnk.

In addition to providing subscribers with information about museum exhibits, programs, special events, volunteer needs and Siloam Springs history, the e-list will have a section on “other items of interest” that will provide information about activities of local organizations, such as Main Street Siloam Springs and the Sager Creek Arts Center.

It will also feature heritagerelated news from other history museums in Northwest Arkansas, especially the nearby Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale and the Heritage Trail Partners.

Don Warden, director of the Siloam Springs Museum, said these new-fangled “ways of communicating with history lovers and museum supporters are very cost effective. The savings in time, postage and reproduction costs can be quite significant. Most nonprofits have been hard hit by the economic stresses of the last couple of years. We are always looking for ways to keep our costs down.”

For additional information, call 524-4011 or e-mail cleessmuseum@centurytel.net.

Lifestyles, Pages 9 on 11/04/2009

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