October 4, 2013 The Ford Museum

Today was museum day and what an incredible museum this is!

“Henry Ford Museum began as Henry Ford's personal collection of historic objects, which he began collecting as far back as 1906. Today, the 12 acre (49,000 m²) site is primarily a collection of antique machinery, pop culture items, automobiles, locomotives, aircraft, and other items."

“Henry Ford said of his museum:

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.”

There are 10 areas to the museum and we went thru all of them.  So here is a sampling:

When we first walked in, there is a very open lobby with a long hallway.  The hallway leads to the museum, restaurant and the Green field Village at the end.

The first exhibit was:

“Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Mayer Wiener,
That is what I'd truly like to be-ee-ee.
'Cause if I were an Oscar Mayer Wiener,
Everyone would be in love with me.”

Don’t you just love that song - .

From there we went thru the agriculture area where the story of farming was told from the very early days thru the recent ones.  There was even a huge combine in here.

This is a Steam Tractor made in 1916.  It was usually shared by many farms throughout the Central States:

This Dymaxion House was in the Museum Gallery area.  It was a round house and was developed in 1929. There were only two prototypes made and this is one of them.  The house was well before its time - sad that it did not go any further. Here is some information on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house

Then we went to Your Place in Time area - what fun!

This is an Overland Car that was known as a ladies car since it had an electric starter, less leg room in the front for the ladies, and more leg room in the back for the men.  Before this, there were few ladies that drove because of the hand crank to start the car.

Silent movies were showing in the little theater:

They had sections for each decade on the culture of that time:

A 1960’s School Room:

Check out what was on the board:

Gosh, I remember hiding under my desk for those drills and being very scared.

The music changes in the Baby Boomer area:

Hate to admit this but I still have some of those albums and 45’s.  Just sold my 8-track collection about 3 years ago. 

The section Liberty and Justice for All told the story of those folks who changed our way of life - from the revolutionary war to recent.

This was the Rosa Parks bus where she took a stand in the Civil Rights Movement:

This was from the section on Women’s Rights that I found interesting:

Did you catch that - 1984 when it was fully ratified.

Our lunch was at Larry’s Diner - YUM:

Our next stop was “Hero's of the Sky - Adventures in Early Flight”

How about this greeting us:

Did you know that Henry Ford built a plane? This was his first - a Flivver.  Henry believed that everyone should have the opportunity to own and fly their own plane.  However this model turned out to be very expensive and dangerous so the idea was dropped.

The Wright Brothers area:

What I find truly amazing is man’s first flight was in 1903 and 66 years later, we land a man on the moon.

Incredible!

Is it a plane or a helicopter:

Our next stop was Driving America that told the American Story in driving.

1903 Holsman Runabout:

1955 Chevrolet hardtop (love that color):

1931 Duesenberg Model J Convertible:

1950 Nash Rambler Convertible:

1958 Edsel Citation Hardtop:

1949 Mercury Convertible:

The pictures don’t show it but the car was purple - neat color.

This is why we have a gasoline tax:

One of Charles Kuralt’s motorhomes:

The early travelers:

I had to put the room in here... Andy and I both did a lot of traveling - together and separate - and we saw many of these rooms.  When we worked we would take a week or two vacation, load up the car and away we would go to explore.  We are so glad we now have a motorhome and blessed that everyday is a vacation.

There was also sections on trucks, garages, presidential cars, and railroads but my camera battery died - .    (I am using another camera - problem with my regular lenses...)

It was a wonderful day at the museum and we highly recommend it. 

Tomorrow we are going to Greenfield Village so stay tuned and enjoy today.