Handbook of Winter Sports cover, 1879. / THF112472
"Within the past decade we have become … a nation of sport-loving people…"
The above quote appeared almost 130 years ago in the small but richly detailed Handbook of Winter Sports. Written by Henry Chadwick, this 1879 handbook provides a fascinating glimpse into the sports that excited and engaged Americans at the time. Sportswriter and promoter Henry Chadwick spent much of his career helping to make baseball America’s “national game.” His ongoing desire to increase Americans’ devotion to “physical exercise and healthful outdoor recreation” is clear in many of the passages of this winter sports handbook.
With the Industrial Revolution cranking up after the Civil War, thousands of Americans flocked from farms and villages to cities for jobs in industry and business. The pressures and routines of the workplace caused many people to begin to view sports as a necessary outlet. Joining an amateur sports club or team provided a comforting feeling of community amidst the growing anonymity in American cities.
Some of the sports described in this handbook may seem a little unusual to us today, but they made perfect sense to Henry Chadwick and his readers back in 1879.
Skating
Early factory-made ice skates, made during the late 1860s by Smith Brothers, Boston, Massachusetts. / THF25566
"The great outdoor recreation of the winter season in our northern clime is, undoubtedly, the invigorating and exciting exercise of skating."
Ice skating was America's first national winter sports craze. When New York City's Central Park opened in 1858, it became a fashionable pastime, both for men and for ladies who wanted to “keep up with the times." Soon, all classes and ages of Americans were taking to the ice—on country ponds, in small-town parks, and at indoor rinks.
1881 trade card advertising the roller-skating rink in Northampton, Massachusetts. / THF225132
By 1879, roller skating was considered a perfect alternative to ice skating—especially for those times when the ice was too rough or too soft, or when "the keen blasts of the winter's wind are too severe." Roller skating would become a huge craze in the 1880s, when almost every city and town had its rink. Story even has it that the upstairs of the J.R. Jones General Store, now in Greenfield Village, was used for roller skating for a time—probably in the late 1870s or early 1880s—back when the store was at its original location in Waterford, Michigan.
Curling
Match between Scottish and American curlers at Cortlandt Lake, Westchester County, New York, from Harper's Weekly, February 9, 1884. / THF700390
"Curling is a game worthy of the hardy Scots, calling into play … most of the characteristics of manliness…"
In the sport of curling, teams of players slide slightly flattened, round granite stones to a designated spot on the ice. From Scotland, curling spread to Canada—where it took permanent hold. Although this sport showed sure signs of popularity in America in the 1870s, it would never have as passionate a following as it did in Canada.
Ice-Boating
Ice-boating is part of this idyllic winter scene, from a trade card for the Young & Striker dry goods store in Amsterdam, New York, around 1890. / THF125112
"…for thrilling excitement [ice-boating] surpasses every other [sport] in vogue."
Ice-boating probably originated in the Netherlands, where frozen canals and lakes became speedy highways during the winter months. This sport's early popularity in America centered around the Hudson River, where ice-boating became a mass spectator sport during the 1870s. Simple ice boats evolved into great ice "yachts"—designed for stability and speed.
Football
This is the first known diagram of an American football field, pictured the 1879 Handbook of Winter Sports. / THF231598
"The game of football is called the 'national winter game' in England, because it is played there throughout the winter season."
Americans don't generally think of football as a winter game. Even Chadwick admitted that "in all but the Southern states, it can only be played during a portion of the winter season, when the snow is off the ground." But by 1879, football was showing definite promise as an up-and-coming American sport. So Chadwick seized the opportunity to document its rules and publish the first known diagram of an American football field in this handbook.
Football, which evolved from the English game of rugby, first became popular as a collegiate sport. The rules of play for the American version of football continued to evolve into the 20th century. Professional football would not come of age until the 1920s.
This 1897 football game shows the rough nature of the sport at the time, predating the use of helmets and padding. / THF117849
The American refinements to English rugby rules included reducing the number of players from 15 to 11; assigning players to specific positions; changing rules for running, kicking, and passing the ball; and replacing the rugby huddles, or “scrummage,” with a clearly defined line of “scrimmage.” As the game became Americanized, it focused more on speed and finesse—with a new emphasis on passing—and away from brute force and roughness.
What's Missing from the 1879 Handbook?
Cover of the 1932 Winter Olympics program in Lake Placid, featuring the exciting bobsled competition. / THF125111
So what about the winter sports we think of today—like basketball, hockey, and skiing?
Basketball was devised at a Y.M.C.A. in 1891 as a way to keep athletes in shape over the winter months. This sport quickly spread to school physical education programs for both boys and girls. It did not go professional until 1946. Skiing was brought to America by Scandinavian immigrants during the late 19th century. Ice hockey came to the United States as an organized sport from Canada during the 1890s. Amateur, youth, and collegiate teams were popular before professional ice hockey gained a national following during the 1920s.
More than any other sports event, the international Winter Olympics (begun in 1924) heightened Americans' interest and enthusiasm for winter sports—especially after the Olympics came to Lake Placid, New York, in 1932.
Then and Now
The pastimes and sports described in the 1879 Handbook laid the foundation for Americans' passion for winter sports. Many winter sports became faster and more competitive. They came to be played by men and women of all ages and provided outlets for people from many different walks of life.
Some winter sports—like football, basketball, and hockey—have become mass spectator sports. However, many others—like sledding, skating, and snowshoeing—still provide opportunities for healthful recreation and, as Chadwick put it back in 1879, "a wonderful power of exhilaration attendant upon breathing the pure oxygen of a winter atmosphere."
You can read the entire handbook in our Digital Collections here.
Donna R. Braden is Senior Curator and Curator of Public Life at The Henry Ford. This post was adapted from the January 2007 entry in our former Pic of the Month series.
19th century, 1870s, winter, sports, football, by Donna R. Braden
That is a very good question! While I don’t recommend moving from a larger space to a smaller one unless you have to (which we did), with time and effort, lots of help, and boxes, it can be done. Being photographers, it’s in our nature to document—well, everything—so come along on a Photo Studio–moving journey with me.
For almost 50 years, The Henry Ford’s Photo Studio has been located at the back of Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation—you may have walked past our windowed French doors on your way from Driven to Win: Racing in America towards the Highland Park engine. The Photo Studio, along with photographer Rudy Ruzicska and I, even made an appearance in Season Two of The Henry Ford’s Innovation Nation.
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Michigan, Dearborn, 21st century, 2020s, photography, Main Storage Building, by Jillian Ferraiuolo, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
In preparing for our temporary exhibit Light and Joy in the Holiday Season, The Henry Ford’s curators solicited artifacts, photographs, and stories from The Henry Ford’s staff, among others. Below is one of the stories that was shared for the New Year display case.
My personal, vegetarian version of hoppin’ john, a traditional Southern New Year’s Day meal, in 2013. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
Though I’ve now lived in metro Detroit for more than two decades, I spent my formative years in the South, growing up in Jacksonville, Florida—the largest city (in terms of square footage) in the contiguous United States, an area split by one of the few rivers in the country that flows north (the St. John’s), and the hometown of Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Neither of my parents were born in Jacksonville. My dad grew up in Pennsylvania, and my mom on Lookout Mountain in the small town of Fort Payne, Alabama. During the Vietnam War, my dad was drafted into the military and sent to Fort McClellan in Anniston, Alabama, to utilize his newly minted bachelor’s degree in architecture to work on base buildings. At that time, my mom was living in Anniston with her sister and her sister’s husband, who was also involved in architecture on the base. My parents met, secretly eloped, moved briefly to Pennsylvania after my dad was discharged, then moved to Jacksonville for a job opportunity for my dad just after I was born.
Being as close to Georgia as you can be and still be in Florida, Jacksonville is definitely the South—the “Bold New City of the South,” as police cars and road signs proclaimed. And Southern foodways predominated, even as economies and cultural traditions slowly became more global. My mother was a fantastic cook who combined her Alabama farm roots with Jacksonville’s traditions—I grew up eating fried okra, grits, redeye gravy, barbecue, boiled peanuts, greens, banana pudding, scuppernongs and muscadines, sweet tea, and pecan pie, and didn’t realize these things weren’t universally beloved, valued, or available until I moved to Michigan.
Greens are a common food in the South. Here, collard greens are de-spined and washed for use in hoppin’ john, 2011. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
One thing I don’t remember ever not having on New Year’s Day was hoppin’ john. The traditional version of the dish is black-eyed peas cooked in broth with onions and a bit of ham or pork, served over rice, often with greens and cornbread on the side. (We Southerners like our carbs.) I don’t know when or where my mother picked up the idea of serving hoppin’ john on New Year’s Day—one of my cousins did not know what hoppin’ john was when I asked her this year, so I am guessing it did not originate in Alabama. She may have learned about it from friends in Jacksonville who followed the tradition.
The reason this humble staple is eaten on New Year’s Day is for good luck—the greens are the color of money, the peas represent coins, and some people even say the color of the cornbread relates to gold. Some long-time family friends from Jacksonville still refer to their annual plate of hoppin’ john as their “luck and money.” But beyond that, it’s a cheap, filling, and delicious meal.
As near as I can recollect, my mom made it fairly traditionally. She might have thrown a hambone into the peas for extra flavor—at least, before I became vegetarian. After I became vegetarian, she would cook a tray of bacon separate from the peas, so that the meat-eaters in the family (e.g., everyone but me) could crumble some over to get their pork fix, while I could eat meat-free, or crumble on some vegetarian bacon.
Soaking black-eyed peas to use in hoppin’ john, 2011. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
When I moved to Michigan, I wanted to continue the tradition with a meat-free version, but also wanted to simplify preparation—cooking peas, rice, and greens all separately, along with cornbread, is a lot of work for one person, especially given that it is most delicious when it all gets mashed together on the plate in the end anyway.
My family tended to like our hoppin’ john peas on the soupy side—something in keeping with the Southern tradition of “pot likker,” where you eat the flavorful broth that forms when you cook vegetables in seasoned water. I also took inspiration from another simple dish my mother made often—“bean soup.” This was just dried beans (pretty much any kind) cooked with onions in broth until they were tender and beginning to fall apart. It might sound dull, but cooked slowly for a couple of hours, and finished with a substantial amount of butter…. Yum. Once it was clear a soup was the simplest way to go, it was a pretty easy logical next step to add the greens right into the soup, removing the hassle of cooking them separately.
Cooking a big batch (for eating and for freezing for later) of my version of hoppin’ john, 2015. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
Below is the recipe (insomuch as I have one) I came up with.
Vegetarian Hoppin’ John (Soup)
Ingredients:
1 lb. dried black-eyed peas
1-2 onions
1-2 bunches collard greens
Vegetable stock, broth, or bouillon
Butter
Vegetarian bacon (I use MorningStar Farms Veggie Bacon Strips)
Preparation:
Pick through the dried black-eyed peas carefully, discarding any brown ones and any stray pebbles. (In my experience, every bag of dried peas contains at least one rock. Though picking through them is tedious, it’s far better to find the pebble(s) with your fingers than your teeth.) Rinse the peas in a strainer, then add them to a large bowl and cover them with a lot of water. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or foil and let the peas soak overnight. They will grow in size substantially, maybe double.
When you’re ready to make the soup the next day, drain the peas, discarding the soaking water, and rinse them again.
Chop the onions and sauté them in a stockpot in some of the butter until partially softened, then add veggie stock and the soaked peas. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Cook until the peas are nearly soft, stirring from time to time, usually one to two hours.
While the peas are cooking, de-spine, wash, and chop the collard greens into bite-sized pieces. When the peas are about half to three-quarters cooked, add the greens to the stockpot, and continue cooking until they are tender. Add additional butter to the soup to taste. (You could also add salt/pepper if desired, but usually the vegetable broth adds plenty of both.)
Cook the veggie bacon according to package directions. Serve up the soup, and crumble a strip or two of veggie bacon on each serving. Enjoy!
The finished product, vegetarian hoppin’ john soup, in 2011. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
Cornbread on the side is pretty much required. My mom made her own dry mix, which she combined with milk, eggs, and (if vegetarians weren’t present) bacon grease to bake, but since I don’t have her recipe, I just (somewhat shamefully) use the one off the back of the Quaker cornmeal package—though I use less sugar, replace the cow’s milk with plant-based milk, and replace the oil with melted butter—so I guess I’ve modified that as well.
I always make a double batch of hoppin’ john and cornbread and stash the remainder in the freezer to get me through the rest of the cold Michigan winter. It just gets better as you reheat it and the flavors continue to meld.
Snowy Michigan on New Year’s Day, 2014. Hoppin’ john freezes really well so it’s wise to make enough to get you through a Michigan winter. / Photo courtesy Ellice Engdahl
Vegetarian hoppin’ john (soup) might not be the most common tradition, especially in Detroit—but it’s a sign of the times that you can find a vegan version today at Detroit Vegan Soul. But the most satisfying version is the one you make yourself—and make your own.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections and Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
20th century, Michigan, Florida, 21st century, 2010s, recipes, home life, holidays, Henry Ford Museum, food, by Ellice Engdahl
Arch Alarm Clock, Designed by Michael Graves, 1999 / THF179673
In 2019, The Henry Ford acquired Michael Graves Design’s extensive product design archive as part of its permanent collection—more than 2,500 objects in total. The Michael Graves Design archive consists of finished products, models, prototypes, and production samples representing partnerships with Alessi, Target, Stryker, Disney, Steuben, Swid Powell, Sunar, Lenox, Dansk, Duravit, and Dornbracht, among others.
“In its entirety, the Michael Graves Design product archive tells a 39-year history of art, culture, and commerce, along with countless stories about the power of design,” said Patricia Mooradian, president and CEO of The Henry Ford. “We are honored that the team chose The Henry Ford as the location to house this collection that shows that everyday products can be designed with both purpose and playfulness.”
This coach's whistle teakettle was designed by Michael Graves for Target in 1999. / THF179699
Graves’ first designs for Target debuted in 1999. The collaboration eventually brought over 2,000 products to market across 20 categories, including kitchen electrics, gadgets, cleaning supplies, home décor, and storage and organization. This groundbreaking 15-year partnership with Target transformed mass-merchandising strategies, elevated consumers’ expectations for design, and made Target a design destination.
In addition to high-end client relationships, Michael Graves Design’s revolutionary approach to common home products, known as “Art of the Everyday Object,” solidified it as a pioneer in the contemporary design industry.
Toilet brush designed by Michael Graves. / THF179683
“Michael Graves and his designers performed a kind of design alchemy, transforming often humble things—thousands of them—into objects of delight, humor, and elegance,” said Marc Greuther, vice president, historical resources and chief curator at The Henry Ford. “He showed that seeming near-opposites, such as practicality, whimsy, affordability, decoration, and modernity, could actually coexist—and move swiftly off the shelves of everyday retailers.”
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home life, shopping, design, The Henry Ford Magazine, by Jennifer LaForce, Henry Ford Museum
Santa Claus employs the latest in transportation technology to share his greetings in this Christmas postcard, 1910. / THF93052
During the first two decades of the 20th century, people were likely to find colorful Christmas postcards when they reached into their mailboxes as the holiday neared. Americans were experiencing a postcard craze!
A New Idea: Sending Holiday Greetings
A pre-postcard era Christmas card by Louis Prang & Company of Boston, 1880. During the mid-1870s, Prang began publishing Christmas and other greeting cards, creating a highly successful Christmas card industry. / THF16646
It’s not that people didn’t send Christmas cards before that time. They did, especially during the 1870s and 1880s as Christmas became more widely celebrated in homes and in the community. Sending a Christmas greeting card was a way to keep in touch with distant family and friends. In the decades following the Civil War, as Congress increasingly standardized delivery, mail traveled more rapidly, dependably, and cheaply than it had before, transporting Christmas cards and other mail throughout the nation.
Post office in the small town of Hoxie, Kansas, about 1913. / THF700079
Yet interest in giving or sending printed holiday greetings through the mail had waned somewhat by the 1890s. That is, until circumstances—lower postal rates and improved delivery service to all areas of the country—helped create a postcard boom for urban and rural residents alike and encouraged a Christmas card revival.
The Postman Brings Postcard Cheer
n 1898, the United States Post Office reduced the cost of mailing privately printed postcards to one cent. As postcards caught the public’s fancy in the first decade of the 20th century, these cards blossomed with colorful images, humorous messages, or holiday greetings. Postcards quickly became an attractive and ready means of inexpensive communication, with room for a personal message on the reverse.
During the “Golden Age” of postcards, from about 1900 to 1914, people bought and mailed billions. In 1904, the New York City post office alone handled about 30,000 cards per day. Many of these billions of postcards were holiday-themed—Christmas postcards were the most popular.
United States Post Office delivery trucks, Ardmore, Pennsylvania, 1908. / THF700044
Mail carrier, about 1925. / THF289999
By 1902, rural mail routes had become a permanent part of the postal service. Instead of having to make a trip into town to the post office to retrieve their mail, rural residents now had the same advantage as city dwellers—mail was delivered directly to their homes.
Rural Free Delivery in a horse-drawn mail delivery wagon, 1895–1920. / THF143935
Rural Free Delivery mailbox, 1900–1916. / THF158049
Christmas Postcard Greetings—Inexpensive and Colorful
Postcard advertising the Souvenir Post Card Company’s line of Christmas postcards, about 1910. / THF700082 and THF700083
These colorful seasonal greetings were not only affordable, they were attractive and appealing.
The time was right. Between 1900 and 1910, entrepreneurs established most of the American greeting card companies, including Hallmark Cards, American Greetings, Rust Craft, and the Gibson Art Company. Many of the colorful postcards companies sold to their American customers were printed in Germany—American printing technology lagged behind that of the Germans.
German-made postcard of Santa and reindeer and sleeping child, 1907-1910. / THF136483
The postcards displayed a range of what we now think of as symbols of Christmas, including Santa Claus, children with toys, Christmas trees, houses and churches in the snow, ice skating, bells, holly, and angels.
This postcard combines holly with a snowy landscape. / THF6869
Postcards sporting images of Santa with reindeer, 1907–1910, and a child with toys, 1905–1910. / THF136481 and THF4503
Christmas postcards—with a snow-covered church, holly, and bells, and with an angel holding a Christmas tree, 1910 and 1915. / THF700046 and THF700048
Up-to-date technology made its appearance in these Christmas postcards as well.
A child uses the telephone, rather than a letter, to communicate her wish list to Santa, 1907. / THF135741
Images of automobiles often appeared on Christmas cards of the era, 1907–1910 and 1910. / THF135814 and THF143923
Santa tries out motorcycle delivery of presents rather than reindeer-powered transportation, 1910–1920. / THF4508
The postcard craze peaked between 1907 and 1910—it was particularly popular among rural and small-town women in the northern United States. Some 700 million postcards were mailed during the year ending June 30, 1908, alone.
Yet the postcard craze would soon ebb. In 1909, a tariff was placed on imported postcards, making the German-printed imports more expensive. The quality of available postcards began to fall. Public interest waned and artistic tastes changed. In 1914, World War I further disrupted the postcard industry, as German-produced cards and high-quality dyes used for ink became unavailable. As the war continued, many companies shifted to greeting card—rather than postcard—production. The telephone probably contributed as well, as more households had phones to reach family and friends more quickly. The “Golden Age” of postcards was drawing to a close.
Step into Christmas Postcards Past
Phoenixville Post Office in Greenfield Village during Holiday Nights. / Photo courtesy of Jeanine Miller
Today, strolling past the Phoenixville Post Office during Holiday Nights in Greenfield Village offers a glimpse into this slice of Christmas postal history.
Photos courtesy of Jeanine Miller and Glenn Miller.
Visitors can experience the early 20th century postcard craze for themselves by posing behind enlarged versions of Christmas postcards placed near the Phoenixville Post Office—and then act as digital “postal carriers” by sending these images to family and friends by text or email.
Photo courtesy of Jeanine Miller.
From a curator’s point of view, it’s a wonderful to see these postcards of Christmas Past become part of Christmas Present! You can take a “peek” into Christmas mailboxes of the past by clicking here to see additional early-20th-century postcards in our collection.
Merry Christmas!
Jeanine Head Miller is Curator of Domestic Life at The Henry Ford. Many thanks to Sophia Kloc, Office Administrator for Historical Resources at The Henry Ford, for editorial preparation assistance with this post.
events, postcards, holidays, Holiday Nights, Greenfield Village, correspondence, Christmas, by Jeanine Head Miller
The Mathematica exhibit in Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. / Photo by KMS Photography
When Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation reopened in July 2020 after months of shutdown because of COVID-19 restrictions, museumgoers were excited to be back on the floor. Many of them were super excited to get back to one of their favorite exhibitions, Mathematica—a favorite because it’s so hands-on.
And therein lay the problem, said Jake Hildebrandt, historic operating machinery specialist at The Henry Ford. As COVID-19 spread, the hands-on interactivity of Mathematica caused it to remain closed. Mixing a little bit of ingenuity, technology, and lots of problem-solving skills, Hildebrandt, along with master craftsman Brian McLean, ensured the exhibition could remain interactive yet hands-free and open to the public.
Mathematica’s Moebius Band was modified by staff from The Henry Ford to start via a hand wave. / Photo by Jillian Ferraiuolo
The push-start buttons on the Moebius Band and Celestial Mechanics installations, for example, are now initiated with a wave of the hand—no touch necessary. And the 27-button panel of the Multiplication Machine has been covered with Plexiglas for safety and new software installed so random math problems run on the cube throughout the day for visitor education and enjoyment.
A newly-added note under the Plexiglas installed on the Multiplication Machine in Mathematica reads “This machine has been temporarily modified for a touch-free experience / It now multiplies random numbers on its own.” The styling of the note is intended to match the original design of Charles and Ray Eames. / Photo by Jillian Ferraiuolo
“Projects like these, DIY challenges that have high criteria, limited time and budget, are my favorite kinds of projects,” said Hildebrandt. All the alterations to Mathematica are easily reversible, he added, and when you head to the museum to see them, you’ll notice the respectful attention given to the exhibition’s classic Eames styling.
This post was adapted from an article first published in the January–May 2021 issue of The Henry Ford Magazine.
#Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford, The Henry Ford Magazine, making, Henry Ford Museum, healthcare, design, COVID 19 impact, collections care
Cars are just one type of artifact that have found a good home in our new collections storage facility, the Main Storage Building. / Photo courtesy Cayla Osgood
With more than 26 million artifacts in our collections at The Henry Ford, storing them all can be a challenge—especially the large industrial, agriculture, and transportation objects. That changed a few years ago, when we began working on an exciting and important project for our institution—the creation of our Main Storage Building, or, as we call it, MSB. Our staff answer a few questions about our newest storage building below.
What is MSB?
MSB is a 400,000-square foot building adjacent to Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. Ford Motor Company occupies the front half of the building, while The Henry Ford occupies the rear 200,000 square feet of space. Today, 178,000 square feet of the MSB is used exclusively for collections storage. The remaining space in The Henry Ford’s portion of the building is home to shipping and receiving, our photo studio, office space, and institutional non-collections storage.
This 1936 photo of the Ford Engineering Laboratory building gives a sense of its scale. / THF240744
What is the history of the building?
Built in 1923–1924, the Ford Engineering Laboratory housed Ford Motor Company’s tool design, production engineering, and experimental engineering research departments. Henry Ford and Edsel Ford both had offices there and, throughout Henry’s lifetime, the lab was the true heart of Ford. The facility was expanded and remodeled several times over the years but had been vacant for some time before the agreement between Ford Motor Company and The Henry Ford was reached.
You can view hundreds of photographs and other artifacts related to the history of the Ford Engineering Laboratory in our Digital Collections, and you can learn about the design of Henry and Edsel’s offices in the building in this blog post.
Though we only recently acquired the building, this is not the first time our artifacts have been stored at MSB. This 1926 photo shows objects collected for the not-yet-completed Henry Ford Museum being stored in the Ford Engineering Laboratory. / THF124539
How did we acquire our portion of the building?
In 2016, we entered into an agreement with our neighbor, Ford Motor Company, to acquire half of the Ford Engineering Lab building. The contract allows Ford to occupy the front half of the building for office space and their corporate archives, while The Henry Ford occupies the rear 200,000 square feet, now referred to as the Main Storage Building, as full owner of that portion.
The Henry Ford’s collections management staff was very happy to visit MSB on our first day of possession, before any artifacts had been moved in. / Photo courtesy Cayla Osgood
Why did we decide to consolidate our collections storage?
Like many museums, The Henry Ford has faced challenges in storing and caring for our holdings, especially the large industrial, agriculture, and transportation artifacts that make up much of the collections. For decades, we rented offsite warehouse space to house these materials. With them came problems—poor accessibility, overcrowding, landlord and lease challenges, and an inability to invest appropriately in rental property. We have made huge strides in caring for and preserving our collections by moving into MSB, including improved access, easy-to-maintain storage environments, enhanced security, and a reduction of overcrowding in storage areas.
Pallet racking and thoughtfully packed artifacts allow us to fit tens of thousands of objects, both large and small, into MSB, while ensuring both their safety and ease of access. / Photo courtesy Cayla Osgood
How did we consolidate our collections storage?
As you might expect, moving tens of thousands of irreplaceable artifacts, many of them large, heavy, and/or fragile, from offsite storage into a new building was a challenge. Learn more about this long and complex process in this blog post.
How much of THF’s collection is housed in MSB?
The MSB represents more than 70 percent of The Henry Ford’s total collections storage space. The building currently holds over 40,000 artifacts, with more than 10,000 of these digitized and available for browsing in our Digital Collections.
Agricultural implements hang from a wire grid within MSB. / Photo courtesy Cayla Osgood
What types of artifacts are stored in MSB?
Within MSB, you’ll find items from our Michael Graves Collection, Westinghouse Historical Collection, Lillian F. Schwartz & Laurens R. Schwartz Collection, Industrial Designers Society of America Collection, Bruce and Ann Bachmann Glass Collection, Bobby Unser Collection, and American Textile History Museum Collection, to name just a few. The artifacts it holds were created as early as the 16th century and as late as this year, and represent a century of institutional collecting, dating back to Henry Ford’s early collecting a full decade before our official dedication in 1929. You can see some staff-selected highlights from MSB in this expert set.
What types of collections work happen in MSB?
In MSB we had an opportunity to create a new collections operations workroom that acts as a collective workspace for multiple teams, including collections management, registrars, curatorial, and photography. In the workroom, we see collections items both existing and new to the collection. Types of work include cataloging and numbering (for tracking), creating storage mounts and boxes, and staging for research. We also pack artifacts to lend to other institutions.
Our conservation department utilizes two different lab areas to treat all artifacts requiring attention in the MSB—everything from vehicles to glass. Photography of smaller objects happens in the photo studio in MSB or in the workroom, while large object photography happens throughout the building—meaning our photography team is quite adept at working with a variety of space and other constraints. You can read more about some of our large object photography projects in MSB in this blog post.
Large artifacts such as these might be photographed in or near their storage locations in MSB for maximum digitization efficiency. / Photo courtesy Cayla Osgood
Beyond this ongoing work, we are still completing our move into the building—all 40,000+ artifacts are being organized, inventoried, and positioned into their permanent locations throughout MSB.
What enhancements are planned for MSB in the future?
As a significant addition to our campus, many enhancements are planned for MSB to optimize the structure for historic collections. Currently, we are continuing important infrastructural work, like roof maintenance and HVAC upgrades, so our collections have appropriate environmental controls to ensure their physical integrity for many years to come.
Once that is complete, we can turn our attention to maximizing our square footage for both access to the collections and issues of density. Specially designed storage furniture called compact shelving helps alleviate wasted aisle space while keeping objects safe and accessible to curators for research, exhibits, and digital uses. As we unpack, this type of storage furniture will allow us to make the most of the 178,000 square feet we have so that we can continue to collect well into the future.
We are so pleased to have this new space and look forward to sharing much more about the work we’re doing and collections we’re housing in MSB!
collections care, Main Storage Building, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
While we have a photo studio where we do most of our artifact photography using white backgrounds and strictly controlled lighting, many times we encounter things that are too big for this setting—for example, a car! In those cases, we need to take ourselves and our studio on the move, and our newest collections storage building, the Main Storage Building (MSB), gives us a perfect environment for that. While sometimes space can be an issue (there are only so many places you can store dozens of wagons and plows), we make the most of the room we have and get creative in the meantime.
For example, to photograph “The Busy World” automaton wagon, it first needed to be moved out of a row of wagons and into an open space to give us room to set up our lights and camera.
“The Busy World” automaton wagon in storage in MSB before photography. / Photo courtesy Jillian Ferraiuolo
The completed photograph of the automaton. / THF187282
Since the Unimate robot was featured in an episode of The Henry Ford’s Innovation Nation, we needed to capture new photographs of it for our Digital Collections before the episode aired. While we had a little more room to work when photographing the Unimate (this was before MSB was as full as it is today), we still benefitted from having the ability to set up all around it because it is extremely heavy and cannot be easily moved. We had to use the space around it to access both sides for our standard photography.
Photographing the Unimate. / Photo courtesy Jillian Ferraiuolo
Completed photo of the Unimate robot. / THF172780
It was a similar situation when we photographed the 1977 Ford Mustang II. Though now this area in MSB houses an array of agricultural equipment, such as plows and wagons, in 2018 we were able to use the open area to photograph the Mustang II for the first time so it could be viewed online.
Photographing the Mustang II. / Photo courtesy Jillian Ferraiuolo
Completed photo of the Mustang II. / THF173560
This next example shows a more current look at MSB in 2021. As you might be able to see, there are many more vehicles now occupying the large area where we shot the Unimate and Mustang II. So when we were tasked with the job of photographing a 1925 Yellow Cab, we were unable to circle around it and had to work with our collections management team to move the taxi for us as we documented it.
Photographing the 1925 Yellow Cab taxicab. / Photo courtesy Jillian Ferraiuolo
You can also see that we created our own white background around the cab with tall foamcore boards (a little thing that helps immensely with post-processing in Photoshop). But our “studio” was surrounded by another car to the right and a wagon to the left! All this careful maneuvering and setup was necessary to get the final image.
Final photograph of the 1925 Yellow Cab Taxicab. / THF188014
Looking at the completed image, you probably would never know what it looked like when we were photographing it out on the floor in MSB!
My final example, the Ford COVID-19 mobile testing van, was so tall that it almost reached the ceiling in the tallest room in MSB. Since it’s a full-sized van, it isn’t easy to move—especially inside a building. In case that isn’t enough, its current neighbors in storage happen to be a couple of large fire engines. Regardless, we got creative again and we were able to get photos of the van despite these challenges.
Photographing the Ford COVID-19 mobile testing van. / Photo courtesy Jillian Ferraiuolo
Completed photo of the COVID-19 mobile testing van. / THF188109
Besides being an invaluable space to store an extensive variety of precious artifacts from our collections, MSB also serves as a functional space for us to use as photographers—so we can digitize artifacts even if they’re larger than we can accommodate in our photo studio.
Jillian Ferraiuolo is Digital Imaging Specialist at The Henry Ford.
Main Storage Building, photography, photographs, digitization, collections care, by Jillian Ferraiuolo, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
The Henry Ford has nearly 26 million artifacts in its care—on exhibit in 82 buildings, housed in the Benson Ford Research Center archive, and stored in multiple storage areas. Caring for these collections is an endless task—light levels, temperature and humidity variations, programmatic usage, even the nature of the artifacts themselves (many items in our holdings were never designed to last)—all create difficulties from a preservation standpoint. Even the most apparently durable and indestructible seeming artifacts need to be cared for—whether on exhibit or held in storage.
For many years our greatest storage problems related to off-site storage in buildings that were not intended for museum collections and whose distance from campus made access difficult. This situation changed in 2016 when The Henry Ford entered into an agreement with our neighbor, Ford Motor Company, to acquire half of the Ford Engineering Lab, a 400,000-square foot building immediately adjacent to Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation.
The Henry Ford’s facilities team began a complicated renovation process on the space, newly designated as Main Storage Building (MSB), turning what had been a cubicle warren of offices into a space suitable for storing historic materials. While the process of rehabilitating the building got under way, historical resources staff began determining where to place and how to move a vast range of over 36,000 artifacts—from giant printing presses and steam engines to tiny buttons and toy tea sets.
The first step in the moving process was to identify collections of similar items (for instance, plows) and create an accurate inventory of what was stored offsite. In this early phase of the project, we would gather anything and everything we thought could be part of this grouping, stage it in one area, and check that the accession number (a unique number assigned to every museum artifact that links the object to information and records on the object—essentially, a Social Security number for artifacts) on each item matched the record in our collections management database. When we encountered objects without accession numbers, we considered these “found in collection” items, and assigned them inventory numbers so they could be tracked in the in the future. After all the new records were created and accession numbers verified, we could then track locations using barcodes and scanners.
Implements lined up for inventory. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
Vacuum cleaners ready to be packed. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
Communications and information technology collections gathered for inventory. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
Before packing, we always assess the condition of the artifacts. We look for mold, hazardous materials, or signs of infestation. In most cases, items were vacuumed or dusted before they were packed away, but sometimes they required more attention to mitigate future problems. In these cases, collections were either isolated or cleaned by conservation staff in one of two labs that were set up in the new building before being moved to their final location within MSB.
The conservation team (pre-pandemic) cleans oversized artifacts in our new lab to prepare them for storage in MSB. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
When packing up the collection, we packed similar items together using archival-quality materials. The move team developed a packing system that could be applied to nearly all of our artifacts. This standardization helped us create more space-saving density in the new building, and helped us to move faster, as we didn’t need to reinvent the wheel every time we encountered a new type of artifact.
Our packing systems were designed to handle both movement and storage, and included these tools and tactics:
- Pallet box containers are stackable gray containers that can be filled with small collections, often housed in custom-built boxes that we created.
- Flat pallets are used for heavy objects secured to pallets with plastic banding. Sometimes we attach plywood to the top of the pallets to create a flat surface.
- Flat pallets with sleeves are used for lightweight objects secured to pallets with Velcro or ties. The pallet is wrapped in a pallet sleeve for additional protection.
- Crates. While we don’t build crates in our department, we do repurpose them for use with heavy, difficult, or fragile artifacts.
- Soft-packing is wrapping artifacts entirely in soft foam or blankets.
- No packing at all is sometimes warranted. Not everything can be packed with packing materials, so such items are carefully strapped onto or into a truck.
Packed collections ready to move, including flat pallets, custom boxes, and pallet boxes. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
Our original moving schedule was spread over 24 months—but then came the COVID-19 pandemic. To meet the changing needs and budget of the institution, we streamlined our operations and adapted our process to accommodate additional staff and contractors to move as quickly as possible while maintaining our standard of collections care and keeping staff safe and healthy. Twenty-four months became nine months—nine months in which we processed, packed, and moved over 17,000 artifacts to complete the move out of offsite storage.
While collections operations staff handled the majority of the objects, we relied on help from three types of contractors: professional car movers, rigging experts, and professional art handlers.
Using professional car movers allowed us to move more than one vehicle at a time, which greatly increased our speed.
The Warrior is loaded into a semitruck (pre-pandemic). / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
The rigging experts had bigger forklifts, trucks of all sizes, and cranes for moving our largest objects.
A steam traction engine is lifted onto custom-built dollies to roll out of the offsite warehouse. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
Finally, professional art handlers were called on to handle and move furniture from our collection, and to offer extra hands to pack and move glass, ceramics, and communications collections located in the warehouse.
Furniture collections stored in MSB. / Photo by Kathleen Ochmanski
We also mobilized our fellow staff members to accelerate the move. Registrars worked at the warehouse each week for six months, helping us complete the inventory phase of the move and soft-packing what they could along the way. Team members from the conservation department worked on artifacts as they arrived at MSB and also ventured to offsite storage during the final three months of packing to help clean the artifacts before they were packed. Also, we can’t thank our shipping and receiving staff enough for helping offload our non-standard objects. We could have never accomplished our nine-month goal without all of these dedicated staff!
On Tuesday, March 16, 2021, the final artifact made its way from the warehouse to MSB. The core team and all who collaborated were there to witness the 606 Horse Shoe Lounge sign loaded onto our truck for the final journey. The sign belonged to the “oldest and last” remaining nightclub from Detroit’s legendary Paradise Valley neighborhood. This last artifact represents the end of an era for Detroit—and for The Henry Ford’s offsite collections warehouses.
Team photograph with the last artifact to leave the warehouse. / Photo by Rudy Ruzicska
MSB is now home to more than 40,000 artifacts previously located in offsite and onsite storage areas, as well as recent new accessions. Centralizing our collections in MSB is an important step in helping us advance collections care through increased access and improved environments. Most importantly, MSB has allowed us to consolidate a large portion of our collections and our collections work into one building, a first for The Henry Ford. While these items are now successfully located in our new building, we continue to work to make MSB truly shine.
Our move from offsite storage has come to an end, and as we continue to unpack, rearrange, and further consolidate our stored collections (there are 14 storage areas onsite…) we are looking forward to sharing more of what MSB has to offer!
Cayla Osgood and Kathleen Ochmanski are Assistant Collection Managers at The Henry Ford.
Main Storage Building, COVID 19 impact, conservation, collections care, by Kathleen Ochmanski, by Cayla Osgood, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
Corey Williams, Dearborn Truck Plant Manager, will tell you that the culture at the plant where the F-150 is built is one of a kind. / Photo by Nick Hagen
Corey Williams has been a part of the Dearborn Truck Plant management team for nearly four years, promoted to plant manager in January 2021, and he’s worked at many Ford facilities in a variety of management positions over the 25-plus years he’s been with Ford. He’ll tell you with conviction that the Dearborn Truck Plant, where the Ford F-150 is built and The Henry Ford’s Ford Rouge Factory Tour welcomes thousands of visitors a year, is unlike anywhere else in the world.
“Every Ford plant has the same goals, metrics and objectives—we all want to deliver the best, highest-quality product to the customer that we can,” said Williams. “But at Dearborn Truck, the culture is different. And when I say different, I mean everyone here understands that we are building America’s bestselling truck and the sense of pride in that is like no other.”
“Everybody knows that we are leaders, never followers,” he added. “That if it can be done, it will be done at DTP [Dearborn Truck Plant]—at not only the highest rate and volumes but with the greatest efficiency.”
Ford F-150 Truck Assembly at the Dearborn Truck Plant at the Ford Rouge Complex
That attitude and mental mantra fit perfectly with Williams’ persona. He’s not afraid to admit he’s an ultracompetitive guy who feeds off having to face the next challenge.
“I’ve been a sports guy my entire life,” he said. “I love to compete and like the idea of a team—the collaborative part of it and how you have to work together toward a common goal.”
And when asked about the new set of players—vehicles as well as workers—that are now ready to call the Ford Rouge Complex home along with Dearborn Truck Plant, Williams couldn’t be more excited. In 2022, the new Rouge Electric Vehicle Center is slated to open, employing hundreds of new hires and manufacturing the all-new battery-electric F-150. “Not a day goes by that people don’t ask me about our new hybrid, the EV center, and electric truck—the buzz and amazement just grows,” said Williams. “It’s a huge step in continuing our truck leadership and dominance. We are changing the game.”
Play to Work
Staff from Ford Motor Company and The Henry Ford trace some of their interest in STEM and manufacturing to childhood television, toys, and games, like this 1960s Clue set in our collection. / THF188744
We asked Corey and other members of Ford Motor Company’s vehicle launch team and The Henry Ford’s Ford Rouge Factory Tour what games, TV shows, toys, etc., they remember growing up that helped spark their interest in STEM and manufacturing.
Corey Williams, Plant Manager at Ford: Playing team sports in his younger years is a key precursor to his manufacturing management skills today. “Involving yourself in team events where you need to collaborate and compete as a team toward a common objective is extremely relevant from a STEM standpoint,” he said.
James Housel, Bodyshop Launch Manager at Ford: “Saturday morning cartoons watching ‘Wile E. Coyote, SUUUUUUPER Genius.’” The cartoon character is always obtaining crazy gizmos from fictional mail-order company Acme in the hopes of capturing the Road Runner.
Cynthia Jones, Director, Museum Experiences & Engagement, at The Henry Ford: “I loved to play the board games Risk and Clue. Both of those helped me identify patterns, test hypotheses, set strategy goals and learn from failure.” Like Williams, Jones, a dedicated swimmer through high school, credits competitive sports too.
Doug Plond, Senior Manager, Ford Rouge Factory Tour, at The Henry Ford: “As a really young tyke, I loved to build with my red cardboard brick set—knocking them down was the fun part. Once I got a bit older, I moved up to Lincoln Logs.”
Jennifer LaForce is Editorial Director at Octane and Editor of The Henry Ford Magazine. This post was adapted from an article first published in the June–December 2021 issue of The Henry Ford Magazine.
African American history, toys and games, The Henry Ford Magazine, sports, Michigan, manufacturing, Ford workers, Ford Rouge Factory Complex, Ford Motor Company, Dearborn, childhood, cars, by Jennifer LaForce, alternative fuel vehicles
