One Lap

Date: 10/17/2013

Day: 21

Location:  Dearborn, MI

Miles Today: 6

Total Miles:  4324

The Colonel Atones for Yesterdays' Lack of Photos:  The Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village.

The Henry Ford Museum

If you are at all interested in the history of technology, a visit to this museum is worth the trouble and expense of a trip to Detroit.  A full day is barely enough time to do it justice.  The collection is eclectic, in that some of it is silly, some is easily disregarded, some even verges on tacky.  Most of it, however, is really quite wonderful.  Not pictured below:

• The chair Lincoln was sitting in when he was shot
• The Kennedy Dallas Limousine
• Washington's camp bed
• A replica of the Wright Flyer.
• It's a lot of stuff, 26 million items, they say.

The Henry Ford Museum began as Mr. Ford's personal collection of historic objects, which he began assembling as early as 1906. Today, it is primarily a collection of antique machinery, pop culture items, automobiles, locomotives, aircraft and other items. 

The Weinermobile.

Oddly, pride of place, the first thing you see when you enter the vast Ford Museum, is a Weinermobile.

 

 

 

Behind the Weinermobile, the collection opens with an amazing array of farm implements.  They are more interesting than you might expect.

American kitchen, 1770's

American kitchen, 1850's

American kitchen, 1900's

American Kitchen, 1930's

 

 

Exterior of R. Buckminster Fullers' Dymaxion House.

The Dymaxion house is a circular structure, supported by a central tower. All the utilities are located in this tower. It was largely made of aluminum, his thought being to use materials with which idle post war aircraft plants were familiar.  It was designed to be about 1,100 square feet and was to be built at the factory as a kit.  It was supposed to cost about $6,500 in 1946, or about as much as a high end automobile.

This is the only remaining Dymaxion house, built from parts of the only two ever actually built.



 

This museum has the best collection of steam engines and dynamos the Colonel has ever seen.

A James Watt steam driven water pump.  It is huge.

This Watt engine was manufactured in 1788 by Charles Summerfield. It is a full-scale working Boulton-Watt engine.  Henry Ford moved the engine to Dearborn around 1930.

Big metal bits.

Highland Park Engine

This electric  generator was originally built for the Ford Highland park factory.  It is a hybrid internal combustion / steam engine, a possibility new to the Colonel.  In 1919, the sign says, it took nine of these devices to satisfy the power demands of Model T production.  This is an active display; the orange wheel moves, the pistons go up and down.  Slowly.

 

Many of these devices, like this 30 ton, 30 foot tall steam engine, are really quite beautiful, even gothic.

The museum has a section called "With Liberty and Justice for All."  There is a good deal on votes for women, but most is focused on race relations.  One wonders what Mr. Ford would have had to say.  He was certainly and flamboyantly unsound on Jews; it is possible his prejudices did not extend to people of color.

Clown suit for a bigot.

We white folks look uncomfortable and ashamed walking though this exhibit, avoiding each others eyes.

The Rosa Parks Montgomery city bus.

The single most memorable thing in this museum, in the judgment of the Colonel, is this bus.  It is the bus in which on December 1, 1955 Rosa Parks refused to yield her seat.  You are allowed to board this bus and sit, whereever you think appropriate.

Ms. Parks.

A DC 3 aircraft.

A Ford Tri-Motor aircraft.

An early McDonald's sign, built back when they were still counting burgers.

Note the bored  counter jockey leaning against the window.

The Ford quadricycle.

A 1937 LaSalle.

Could Edith and Archie have driven a car this cool?

A 1949 VW.

1965 Lotus-Ford Race Car

This is one of the most important cars in American racing history.  In 1965 Jimmy Clark drove this car to victory in the Indianapolis 500.  The Colonel was there in 1965 when this car won. a high school graduation present from his father.  He can still feel the noise as the cars came down the opening straight for the first time.

The Lotus chassis driven by a Ford engine effectively killed the traditional Indy roadster and established a new paradigm for American race cars. The engine was a Ford V8, double overhead cam, 256 cu. in., delivering 495 hp.

 

The "Great Sign" of Holiday Inn

This sign was in use from 1952 to 1982.

An H8 Allegheny Locomotive.

These were the heaviest reciprocating steam locomotives ever built, at 389 tons for the locomotive itself plus 215 tons for the loaded tender.  Sixty H-8s were built between 1941 and 1948 to haul coal for the Chesapeake and Ohio railroad.

 

An electric train display with live electric train weenies very glad to discuss same.

What is clever here is a miniature TV camera on one of the engines.  This allows you to see on the monitor the road bed from the perspective of a very small electric train engineer.  On the flat screen display is the only image you will ever see of Colonel Wellington Boot.

Note the big steam engine in the background.

 

 

Greenfield Village

Greenfield Village is the largest outdoor museum complex in America.  Nearly one hundred historical buildings from the 17th century to the present were moved to the property from their original locations and arranged in a "village" setting.  The facility has 240 acres of land of which only 90 acres are used for the attraction, the rest being forest, river and extra pasture for the sheep and horses and a working farm.

Mr. Ford.  Note the lean and hungry look.

"I am collecting the history of our people as written into things their hands made and used.... When we are through, we shall have reproduced American life as lived, and that, I think, is the best way of preserving at least a part of our history and tradition..."

 

Note that they do not call Mr. Ford an inventor.

The Wright Brothers Cycle Shop

The Wright bicycle shop and home were bought and moved by Henry Ford in 1937 from Dayton, Ohio.

The Wright family home.

 

A replica of Thomas Edison's Menlo Park New Jersey laboratory complex. It's reconstruction started in 1928 and both Mr Edison and President Hoover were there in 1929 for its dedication.  The guide indicates the chair in which the great man (Mr. Edison) sat.  Where the President sat is, apparently, lost to history.  The buildings were laid out according to exact foundation measurements from the original site and incorporated whatever usable materials remained there.   It was furnished with original or faithful duplicates, all placed as they were originally.

Note the belt driven machinery.

The Sarah Jordan boarding house.

This building is important because, located across the street  from the Menlo Park lab, as many as 16 of Edison's workers lived here.  When they needed a venue to demonstrate to investors how electric lights would work in a home, they used this boarding house.  It is the first residential building in the world to be electrified.  It is completely original and was still in use when it was moved to Greenfield village.

Note the DC wiring.

The Lincoln Courthouse

Abraham Lincoln practiced law in this Logan county, Illinois courthouse.  He and the other circuit riders would spend two one week sessions here each year.   After the Rosa Parks bus, this  building is sufficient reason to visit this museum.

 

 



The Ackley covered bridge

This 75' wooden covered bridge was built in 1832 in southwestern Pennsylvania and removed to the village in 1937.

 

Mysterious doings across the street and wall at the Ford test track.

 

 

This was intended to be the last Model T.  There is a picture of Edsel driving his father off the assembly line in this vehicle.  The story told here is that there were  15,007,??? model T's made, because there were that many parts left lying around and Mr. Ford did not want them to go to waste.  Other sources claim that between 1909 and 1927, 14,689,520 Model T's were made.  It is a lot of cars either way.

 

 

Want a ride?

 For $5 you can ride in a Model T at Greenfield Village.  It is a surprisingly snappy ride given the 20 hp motor.  According to my chauffeur, there are still millions of Model T's in operation and getting parts for them is no issue.

Tomorrow a drive to Buffalo and an anxious wait for the Mrs. Colonel, due in at 10 AM the next morning.

Wellington Boot, Col.