The Fords, Dearborn Michigan

On Monday and Tuesday we visited the Henry Ford Museum, the adjacent Greenfield Village and the Edsel Ford home which is located in Grosse Pointe Shores about 10 miles further. 

One might anticipate that the Ford Museum would contain only Ford memorabilia but they would be mistaken.  While there is plenty of Ford information there, it contained many more historical artifacts.  We have learned that Henry Ford was not only brilliant but a caring individual.  He had an appreciation for people who were intellectual and excelled in their field and that is evident in the Greenfield Village.  The Greenfield Village was begun in 1930's and contains many original buildings and artifacts which we'll talk about later on.  The museum shows Mr. Ford's keen interest in the history of this country.  In the museum are trains, planes and automobiles.  There are too many to talk totally about but Van has a few favorites we'll mention.

One of the items in the museum was the Fifteen Millionth Model T Ford.



Some of the other items are the field trunks used by George Washington which actually contained the cot that he slept on and cooking and eating utensils. 



There was also the actual rocker that Lincoln was seated in when he was assassinated.



This is the actual car that Kennedy was sitting in when he was assassinated.

This is the actual Rosa Parks' bus
 
This is the "Bullet" which held the world land speed record for some 25 years.

We must add a little bit of humor.  Also there was the Oscar Mayer Weiner vehicle and also a sofa which looks like a hot dog bun with the hot dog and condiments, ketchup, mayonnaise and relish.  I only did this for my grand babies but it was fun being a "hot dog."














When we finished the museum we went to Greenfield Village which has more exhibits than can be imagined.  Henry Ford's love of history is evident in this village.  He selected buildings associated with pioneers of American history and their contributions to the American way of life.  He had many original buildings taken apart and moved to this location for the purpose of education of people.  This is a wonderful, wonderful opportunity for family and children.  Plan to spend the day if you come.

Below is Henry Ford's childhood home which he shared with his parents and 5 brothers and sisters.  Henry did not like farm work and his interests were more creative in nature so he left home at the age of 16 for the city.

A few of the buildings that found most interesting are listed below.




One of the buildings was an actual courthouse where Abraham Lincoln practiced law prior to becoming President











Another is the Heinz house which
obviously is of the Heinz family.
It was interesting to find out that their first product was not ketchup but was in fact horseradish sauce.




 
This is believed to be the oldest windmill in the United States



This is Orville and Wilbur Wright's home.  They also have on sight the bicycle shop from which they devised some of their designs in making the plane.

 

This is my favorite "little" house in the Village.  It is called the Cotswold Cottage, which is an exact reproduction of an old English cottage.  This style is also the style that Edsel and Eleanor Ford designed their house in Grosse Point Shores after.  If you can't tell, I am standing in the doorway of "my" new home!



This is the Noah Webster Home.  It was initially designed as his retirement home.  However, as it turned out he did many years of work in this home on adding to the "Webster" dictionary.

 

 

This was a restaurant featuring southern cooking and was named Mrs. Fisher's because she was one of the very first black persons to publish a cookbook.  We elected not to eat there and instead chose the Eagle Tavern which featured primarily period recipes.  The waiters were dressed in period clothing also.  Among other things, they featured the corn chowder and mint julep drinks (which were incredible).  We asked for and they gave us the recipe for the corn chowder and Van got a personal lesson from the bartender on how to make real mint juleps.
 
 

 

The next day we toured the 60 room mansion of Edsel and Eleanor Ford.  It was located on a lake with breathtaking views.   The home was built in the style of the Cotswold Cottage and it was 30,000 square feet.  Edsel was the only child of Henry and Clara Ford.  Edsel and Eleanor had 3 boys and 1 girl.  There is only surviving one of the boys.  Edsel died in his late 40's about 3 years before his father Henry died.  Eleanor stayed in the house until 1976 upon her death.  We were not allowed to take pictures of anything inside the home which was a shame because there is no way for us to describe this house in enough detail.  Most of the wood paneling, stairway and furniture was from between the 1500's to the 1700's and was brought for use in the home from all over the world, mostly England..


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


When their daughter, Josephine, turned 12, her grandmother had her a "playhouse" built.   This is a picture of the playhouse.   The architect designed the house on a 2/3 scale.  Can you imagine how much fun she had playing there with her friends.





We head out in the morning for Canada and will be turning our phones off but we will have access to email and facebook if you need us.  We are really excited about going to Niagara Falls on the Canadian side.  It just so happens that Chris has a family reunion in Buffalo, New York this weekend, so he and Kristin are flying up to Buffalo on Friday for 3 days and even though we probably won't have time for us to really see each other, we are hoping at least to get a hug and kiss.

Keep us in your prayers for safe driving.  We miss everyone.

 
 
 
 

Gilmore Car Museum

Friday we went to the Gilmore Car Museum which is located in Hickory Corners, Michigan, which is in the middle of absolutely nothing but corn.  When we arrived to our location, boy were we surprised.

The museum was started by Donald S. Gilmore after his wife gave him an old Pierce Arrow when he retired as President and CEO of Upjohn Pharmaceuticals.  His mother was widowed and 5 years later married a local physician named William Upjohn who was also widowed with children.  Dr. Upjohn started the Upjohn Pharmaceutical Company and Donald Gilmore ended up marrying his step-sister, making Dr. Upjohn both his step father and his father-n-law.  It was Donald Gilmore who grew the company.  Under his leadership, the company developed cortisone and synthetic steroids.  He was personal friends with Walt Disney and, in fact, tried to get Walt Disney to bring his theme park to this area (Grand Rapids area) instead of Orlando.  Mr. Disney declined due to the weather in Michigan.  The museum is the only place which has an actual movie set from a Disney movie.  The set is part of the Gnome movie which is the inside of a car made oversized so the life sized people would look small. 

A sample of 1 of the many buildings showing a
ramp to get cars to the 2nd floor

 

There are so many vehicles on exhibit in the museum.  There are approximately 10 or so buildings meandering over approximately 90 acres of land.  The museums are constructed like large barns and each barn houses genres of vehicles.  We estimate that there are several hundred million dollars worth of vehicles here.  There are so many that it is impossible to even begin to talk about them.  We must, however, point out a few.
 

 

This motorcycle was the one used by Henry Winkler (the Fonz) on Happy Days.  The one below, as we understand it, was used in a

Harry Potter movie.

There are many Pierce Arrow automobiles contained in one building and this one of the many fine examples.



This is a 1938 Mercedes.

This is a 1933 Lincoln Phaeton

This is a 1959 Metropolitan that Van is standing next to.  It just so happens that when Van was in college he had one exactly like this.  Same year and same colors.










We don't remember what kind of vehicle this is but it was manufactured with a wooden frame









This is the famous Tucker automobile.










This is a 1931 Pierce Arrow limousine which is unrestored.  The inside view below shows how fancy the interior was, which included the top hat rack and flower vase.
 
 

The founder of the museum's son inherited enough money where he could have done nothing if he had chosen to but instead his father had instilled in him to work, which he did.  He also fell in love with racing and  became the owner of the Gilmore Racing Team which A.J. Foyt raced with.  The picture shows one of A.J.s cars.



This museum has many cars that we did not talk about including, believed to be, the very first automobile.  The Oldsmobile turbine car, which actually had an airplane jet engine in it.  There was also a 1931 Model A Ford pick up truck which was very similar to the one Van bought right before he went off to college and his grandmother sold while he was away in school.  Also, there was a 1907 electric run about child's toy car, which cost $800, which was $150 more than the popular full sized automobile of that year.  This museum is really a must see if you care anything at all about vehicles.  For me, I know nothing about vehicles  but I do know when something is beautiful.

We are now north of Detroit sightseeing this area until Thursday.  Then we head to Niagara, Canada.  Wifi is "iffy" here so hopefully we can blog again soon.

Meyer May House, Grand Rapids, MI

Thursday we decided to go back into Grand Rapids and see the Meyer May House.  The architect of the house was the famed Frank Lloyd Wright.  This was his first commission in Michigan.  The owner of the home owned a clothing store downtown.  Meyer May, his wife and 2 adopted children built the home.  Sadly the wife died 2 years later.  Meyer remarried and his new wife had 2 children.  The house was only 3800 square feet with 3 bedrooms, 2 baths and 1 bedroom for the maid.  An addition was made to the home at this time.  All the homes that surrounded this new home were built in the Victorian style, making this home really stand out.  This house was built in the prairie style, which Wright as famous for.  As was customary, not only did Wright design the home, but he also designed all of the furniture, rugs, light fixtures, etc  for the home, scaling the furniture to Meyer May's height.  Mr. May was very short so when you walked near the wall scones you had to be careful because they were hung lower than normal. 

The house was built in 1908, Meyer May lived in the home until his death in 1936, and the house was used a private residence until 1985.  At that point it was in horrible disrepair so in 1986, Steelcase, Inc. (a local office furniture company), made the decision to restore the home.    It took approximately 2 years for the home to be totally restored.  The addition that had been added had to be removed so it could be restored identical to how it was originally built.   Before we toured the home they showed a video on how the reconstruction and reproduction was accomplished.  You would be amazed at the amount of work and research was done to bring this home back to its original splendor.   Most of the furniture was missing from the home, as were the rugs, which were perfectly reproduced from the research done.