The Imperial War Museum, 1917–1939

Museums serve multiple, interconnected functions. As institutions, they can guide, influence or control how society operates and generates knowledge and understanding about itself. As organisations, they can help to achieve specific aims and objectives. And as museums, they collect, preserve and present the culture of society and its environment. This context influences how museums form, behave and manage different crises. The current chapter characterises the Imperial War Museum as an institution, organisation and museum, from its inception during the First World War to the start of the Second World War. It shows that the Imperial War Museum of the inter-war years established a precedent for institutional, organisational and museological adaption, a quality which would come in useful when managing the challenges posed by the Second World War. It also shows that the selected historical case bears many similarities with contemporary museums, demonstrating the study’s applicability to museums facing crisis and change in the present-day context.