That suitcase is one of about 40 that have been devised as part of House of Memories, the Liverpool Museums’ multipronged dementia program, which just celebrated its fifth birthday. The program also has its own app, offers training days for caregivers and family members, and memory walks, hourlong guided tours of the Museum of Liverpool devised to get older visitors to share their memories of life in the city.

The suitcases cover 1930 to 1980. Themes include transportation, the natural world and ethnicity; for example, Irish and Afro-Caribbean people are among the groups represented. One suitcase contains items like fliers from early Gay Pride marches and club nights; photos of venues in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s; and a pair of brown suede Hush Puppies, which some gay men wore to spot each other at a time when homosexuality still had not been decriminalized in Britain.

Backed by the British government and by state-funded British health care partners, House of Memories has now trained more than 12,000 people nationwide, and is crossing the Atlantic: The Minnesota Historical Society plans to offer its version of the app in the fall.

The idea first came to Ms. Rogers as a way of “supporting our aging society,” she said. “Globally, we’re all living longer, and we all want to live well, but there are older people in our community who are socially isolated,” she said. “They’re lonely.” Among them, people with dementia are particularly isolated, she said, and museums with recent collections could help. Photographs, memorabilia and objects — be they the actual items or images of them on apps — help rekindle memories in people with dementia and lead them to start conversations.