Dear Ross:
Sorry to hear that you had a bad experience with Doc Roberts.
Mine was quite different. In the early 1970s' we were restoring the Russian Decapod, FRISCO No. 1630 at the Illinois Railway Museum. The builders plates were missing but I knew that the sister loco at MOT had plates, so I asked to borrow them to copy. The answer was no, but we were told that we could make rubber molds of the plates as long as we didn't remove them. A couple of our guys went down and made the molds, no problem. Looking at the molds, we discovered that the sister loco was wearing the builders plates off 1630! Upon inquiry, we were told "Oh, we put those plates on so our engine would look complete and the originals for our loco wouldn't be lost". Long story made short, IRM paid for reproduction plates to be made for the loco at MOT and IRM was given the original plates for 1630, one each in Russian and English. We made reproductions of these to put on the 1630 and locked up the originals.
It took a while, but he did the right thing with us.
J.David

A very valuable point is noted here.
Perception becomes reality, the visitor who complained about the condition of MOT hadn't been back in years, and hence had no understanding of the changes that had occured.

I personally first visited MOT in the late sixties as a child of perhaps 8-10 years old. As a young child I was amazed at some of the items in the collection, for example while I knew what a Milw RR Bipolar was, but I never dreamed I'd actually see and touch one, much less get in the cab of it. Having said that, it was very much a collection in disarray, I recall with great clarity asking my father why the place looked like a junkyard for trains, planes, and other items.

I didn't get a chance to get back to MOT until about 1995. The museum from my childhood memories was in very stark contrast to what I saw before me now. All the highlight memories where there, the bipolar, Aerotrain, the IT railbus, etc, plus items I had come to better understand and appreciate the importance of, the FT set, the IT C-class locomotive, etc. It was an experience where the difference was far above that of night and day, it was a difference of a fire engine compared to an apple.

Clearly a huge amount of work, and money had gone into stabilizing the collection as well as making the place much more visitor friendly.

But, without exposure or notice, I have to wonder, would I still have thought the MOT was a junkyard for trains ? Would that preclude most people, rail enthusiasts or otherwise from ever returning ? I think the rail enthusiast will return just to see that prized "whatever", but the typical visitor, the family with the 2.3 kids, likely won't.

The efforts of MOT over the past 30 odd years are obvious and they are to be commended, no matter what forces combined to get them in a place where so much work was needed in the first place.

A valuable lesson is here for everyone, all that work while certainly valuable, never realizes it's full value if it isn't known.