Thursday, July 25, 2013 – White Lake and Dearborn, MI
We left Canada behind and made our way into Michigan. It wasn’t without some challenges. For some reason, our GPS was acting up in this Northern Country. We wanted to travel from Toronto back to the US via Port Huron. For some reason our GPS would not take us on this route, It insisted on taking us through Windsor, Ontario. While that route may have been a little shorter, we specifically wanted to take this other route. So, we would have to make our way the good old fashioned way. After a few wrong turns, we did make it there. We made our way across the bridge and stopped at the US Customs and Border Patrol. We were asked if we had purchased any fruits or vegetables in Canada. We had purchased some blueberries which, fortunately for us, did not pose a threat to the US and we were allowed to bring them in. He then asked us if we had any citrus with us. We happened to have ½ of a lemon with us that came off of our tree in California. Apparently, since that lemon left the US and entered Canada, it was now considered a “foreign” lemon and would have to be discarded – but he let it slide and we got to keep our lemon. It’s a good thing that rule doesn’t apply to people, or we might have had a problem with our passports.
We arrived at our friend’s Lauren and Alex’s home in White Lake, MI. They recently got married in June of this year and we were fortunate to go to their wedding and host their rehearsal dinner at our home. It was good to see them even though they are still in the process of moving into the home they purchase in May. They live in this cute yellow house that is very close to a lake where they have an easement giving them access to the lake where they can dock their boat. They are making a very nice home here in Michigan along with their dogs Cody and Jake, their parrot named Kiwi and 2 turtles and 1 Chinese Water Dragon lizard.
We really enjoyed spending time with Alex and Lauren and hearing about their exciting trip back from San Diego. The drove Alex’s truck with a 5000 pound trailer in tow that had a 3500 pound car in it along with some other items they were bringing back to Michigan. The truck with 10000 pounds in tow had a real challenge making it through the mountains, sometimes at 15 mph, in Wyoming, but they did manage to make it home. Lauren made us an excellent dinner of beef enchiladas that had both shredded beef and ground beef in it. We’ve been away from San Diego for over a month now and I was really in need of some good mexican food and the enchiladas really hit the spot.
The next morning we got up and headed into Dearborn, Michigan to visit the Henry Ford park. This park has several different attractions and it includes Greenfield Village, the Henry Ford Museum, IMAX theater and the Ford Rouge assembly plant tour. We opted to visit each of these with the exception of the IMAX theater.
Greenfield Village was started by Henry Ford in 1929. He used a large piece of land he had acquired for the factory he build along the Rouge River in 1923 that he would use to assemble the Model A Fords. In this village, Ford began collecting a number of famous homes, buildings, laboratories. He had a passion to study and preserve things that he felt represented technological breakthroughs of their time. As an example, he acquired the original building where Wright Brother’s operated their bicycle business and the shop where they built their famous flying machine. Ford had the building shipped brick-by-brick from Dayton, OH to the sight in Dearborn, Mi. It is amazing to see it here. Ford also purchased and moved the house that the Wright Brothers used at Kitty Hawk for testing and flying their plane. The village also includes the home of Luther Burbank, George Washington Carver, and many other famous scientists and inventors. Ford had become good friends with Thomas Edison. In fact as a young man, Ford worked as an engineer in one of Thomas Edison’s electric generating plants in Detroit. Ford eventually acquired and move a number of the buildings and laboratories that Thomas Edison had used in Menlo Park, NJ to invent the phonograph, the filament for the electric bulb and many other inventions. Ford had wanted to acquire the electric generating plant that he worked in as a young man, but he was not able to do so. So he had an exact replica of the plant build in ¾ scale. It is an amazing place that sprawl over several acres. We estimate that we walked several miles seeing all the different buildings. One of the buildings included a machine that was driven by water that would take sheered wool from sheep, and brush it to de-mat it, remove burrs and thistles and prepare it for spinning into yarn or thread. This machine proved to be a huge time saver and revolutionized the textile industry. Hence, Henry Ford added it to Greenfield Village. We also saw an early machine shop that was very interesting. There was a huge spinning drive shaft that spanned the ceiling of this large shop. From that shaft there were several large leather belts that would come down to different machines such as lathes, mills, drills. To use one of the instruments the operator would throw over a lever that would engage the leather drive belt onto the overhead spinning shaft. The could control the speed of the machine by sliding the drive belt over different sized spindles. The main drive shaft that would power each of the machines was powered by a single 10 horsepower steam engine. Each of the machines is maintained in working order and we got to see a demonstration of them making a candle stick holder out of brass. We easily spent 2 and a half hours looking at all the different buildings. I was intrigued by the many different Ford Model T and Model A vehicles they had ferrying people around the village. Each of these automobiles are in original condition and is beautifully maintained in fine working order – not bad for cars that are close to 100 years old. The only thine we didn’t like was the lack of emissions control they were a little smelly. For that matter, several of the horse drawn vehicles making their way around the village also lacked “emission controls” and they were a little smelly as well.
From there we went to the Ford Museum. We were expecting this to be a museum dedicated to Henry Ford. We were surprised to find a museum dedicated to American Culture as influenced by transportation. Once again the scale and size of this museum was immense. We spent an hour and a half in this museum and did not manage to make our way through the entire thing. The car collection was amazing. It includes all makes and models of cars. The focus is on cars that represented innovation in the industry. The innovation may have been technical, styling, marketing or vehicles that were otherwise historic. The collection included the actual 1906 Oldsmobile that was the first vehicle to traverse the US from coast-to-coast. It includes one of only 50 Tucker automobiles to be in existence. They have only a small fraction of the automobiles in their collection on display and they rotate them regularly. They have a number of different early vehicles that enabled Americans to travel the country. There are some early examples of campers, motorhomes and other types of RVs. There is an original 1950 – 1960 vintage sign for Holiday in with the giant arrow. They also have an actual 50’s vintage room from a Holiday Inn Motel. They have a huge neon sign from an early 60s McDonalds restaurant. They also have a collection of several presidential limousines.
After seeing the automobile collection we then entered the aviation collection. This collection boasts one of Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed aircraft. There is a full sized DC-3 suspended above the museum goers. There is an exact replica of the Wright Brother’s aircraft. There are a number of aircraft dedicated to barn storming era, Aircraft in industry, passenger transport and military. Amazing! There were another 2 sections of the museum that we didn’t get to see. It was approaching 2:30 and the last tour of the Ford Factory was at 3:00.
So we cut our tour of the museum short so we wouldn’t miss the factory museum. We caught a bus that took us on a 10 minute drive over to the Factory. This factory was built by Ford in 1923 and it took several years to complete it. Ford’s dream was to build a fully self-sustaining factory. Raw materials would go in at one end and finished automobiles would exit from another end. Here Ford smelted his own steel and had his own forging and stamping operations. He would make every part of the automobile himself and not be dependent on subcontractors – he would have a plentiful source for raw materials. Consequently, the scale of the factory is huge – it measures about 1.5 miles square. The first vehicles produced in the plant was the Model T and several million were produced in this factory. Later the factory would produce T-Birds, Mustangs and F-150 trucks. The plant was also converted to build items in support of the WWII. Truck fabrication has played an important role at this factory since 1948 and today the factory is dedicated to the production of the F-150 of all varieties. The steel making portion of the plan is still in operation but it was sold and is now operated ob others. Engines and transmissions for the trucks are now built elsewhere as are many of the other finished parts. The body stampings, chassis, rear ends and other suspension parts are still made at the factory. The cab of the trucks and the beds are paired after fabrication. The enter a large facility together where they are run through a zinc bath for anti-rust protection and then they are painted at the same time. Interestingly, the cab, doors and the bed then head to separate parts of the assembly plant only to magically be rejoined at the right time and in the right place at some other part of the factory where doors are mounted on the cabs and cab and bed are mounted on the chassis. It is a logistical marvel move these components through the factory covering several acres and then have them come back together at the just the right time. Understandably, photos are not allowed in the factory assembly area. It is difficult to describe in words the magic that goes on in this factory. There are huge parts soaring on overhead conveyors to bring truck beds and cabs together. The use of robotics is extensive. The cab will lower in one work station to make it easier for assemblers to do their particular job. When it moves to the next station, the cab will raise up several feet so that workers at this station can will be able to do their job without having to bend over. Large heavy components that need to be installed such as windshields, sunroof assemblies and dashboards are positioned into place on mechanical robots so that the workers only need to make minor alignments and attach the necessary screw or bolts. It was a beautiful dance of man and machinery out there. Both Elisa and I looked at the trucks coming together and we saw the pride that the workers seemed to put into their construction. We promptly declared that we had an urge to buy a new F-150 pickup truck.
Alas, it was time to head back to White Lake, about an hours drive so that we could get some dinner with Alex and Lauren and we still had to drive to Ludington, MI that night so that we could make our 9:00 AM departure time on the SS Badger. The Badger would ferry us across Lake Michigan over to Wisconsin. We left White Lake at 8:15 PM and we rolled into the overnight parking lot at the ferry terminal in Ludington at 12:15 AM.
I will post a link to the many other pictures we took a little later, so check back to look at this post from time to time.
Photo 1 – Here are Alex and Lauren, our friendly hosts for our night in White Lake, MI. We were able to park our RV in their driveway.
Photo 2 – Henry Ford marveled at what tremendous change and growth was made possible in America by the application of the steam engine. It’s most visible applications is the steam locomotive. Henry Ford bought one and brought to this site in 1929.
Photo 3 – The Wright Cycle Co. This is the original building the Wright brothers operated out of in Dayton, OH
Photo 4 – This is a replica that Henry Ford had built of his first factory with the name Ford Motor Co. Ford had made 2 earlier attempts to start auto companies but failed each time. On his third attempt he got it right by implementing the assembly line process.
Photo 5 – In this photo is the actual 15 millionth Ford Model T that was assembled. It was also the last Model T after that the Model A was in production.
Photo 6 – This is one of the laboratories from Thomas Edison’s Menlo Park complex. This was the laboratory where the phonograph was invented. There is a working model of the actual machine that Edison used to test his idea.
Photo 7 – These were actual slave cabins moved to the Greenfield Village from a Plantation in South Carolina. Edison believed that productivity was best achieved by paying a worker a fair wage and providing good work accommodations. He wanted to preserve these an a reminder of a dark time in America.
Photo 8 – This was an actual working machine shop where all the tools were powered by a single 10 hp steam engine.
Photo 9 – This was the cabin that belonged to George Washington Carver.
Photo 10 – This is an actual stone cottage built in 1600 that Edison had moved from England to the US because he thought it represented durable construction using available materials.
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