Nikita Stewart of the Washington Post’s DC Wire reports on an intriguing proposal before the Council today from Harry Thomas Jr. (D-Ward 5). Thomas has suggested a partnership between the African-American Civil War Museum and the DC Public Library.

The proposal has been greeted warmly by the museum’s founder: “Frank Smith, founding director of the foundation that runs the museum, said the joint venture would allow the library to promote the museum and the museum to provide the library’s users to access the museum collection.” Certainly the mention of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture flatters everyone involved.

Yet if a Schomburg Center is what Thomas has in mind, staffing probably won’t be among the chief difficulties, as Smith suggests. A larger collection is necessary to attract the interest of both the public and specialists in the field, and that will be a greater expense than staff. As one historian suggested to me, if a collaboration toward a true research center is going to be more than one in name only, the African-American Civil War Museum will need to partner with an institution with resources: money, but also connections to fundraisers, grantwriters, and leadership. Whether DC Public Library is able to provide those resources isn’t clear, but this writer is skeptical.

Nevertheless, an African-American Civil War Research Center would be a welcome idea — a valuable addition to DC’s research institutions and one dedicated to a fascinating and underappreciated topic with real local roots. If Thomas’s proposal is the first step toward developing a significant collection — as a different historian suggested is a “charitable” reading of the news — it is a proposal worth financial support.

Photo by Grundlepuck