Posts Tagged digital collections
We are closing in on the end of our multi-year project to digitize photographs related to the buildings in Greenfield Village, and one of the most recent buildings we’ve tackled has been the William Holmes McGuffey Birthplace. In the 1830s, McGuffey created a series of textbooks commonly known as McGuffey’s Readers, intended to teach reading and writing to various grade levels of schoolchildren. Henry Ford used these readers as a child and considered them an important influence in his life, so he moved the Washington County, Pennsylvania birthplace of McGuffey to Greenfield Village in the early 1930s, dedicating it on September 23, 1934, the 134th anniversary of the author’s birth. Among the several dozen images we’ve just digitized is this 1845 portrait of Harriet Spining McGuffey, who became William Holmes McGuffey’s wife in 1827.
Visit our Digital Collections to view all of the newly digitized images, or browse through other McGuffey-related artifacts, including a number of McGuffey Readers.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
Henry Ford, Pennsylvania, 19th century, 1830s, William Holmes McGuffey Birthplace, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, education, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl, books
The “Barnstormers” section of the Heroes of the Sky exhibit in Henry Ford Museum covers early 20th century pilots and aerialists who would perform daring airplane stunts to entertain audiences watching below. The Laird Biplane Boneshaker that appears in the exhibit was flown by Katherine Stinson, an aviator in her mid-20s, on international exhibition tours in 1916 and 1917. We’ve just digitized a couple dozen photographs and clippings that relate to Stinson and the various planes she flew, including this image taken at the Tri-State Fair in Memphis in fall 1916—the back of the photo notes that she flew that day wearing this same ensemble, with the addition of a helmet and goggles. View all the Stinson-related materials by visiting our Digital Collections—and to learn even more about Katherine Stinson, watch for her to be featured in a segment of The Henry Ford’s Innovation Nation later this year.
Additional Readings:
- 1939 Douglas DC-3 Airplane
- Reliability Tours Land Public Trust
- 1920 Dayton-Wright RB-1 Airplane
- Just Added to Our Digital Collections: Lillian Boyer Photographs
Heroes of the Sky, Henry Ford Museum, The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation, women's history, airplanes, flying, aviators, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl
We are about 35% of the way through our 24-month project to digitize 900 artifacts from our electrical distribution collections, thanks in large part to a generous grant from the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and nearly 100 objects from the grant are currently accessible through our Digital Collections.
Outside that project, but on a related note, we’ve just finished digitizing 132 photos of figures associated with the same companies as the objects we’re digitizing in the grant. For example, now you can see images of people associated with Westinghouse Electric Company, and also find objects created by that company, most of which were conserved and photographed through the grant. One intriguing image we found is this 1880 photograph of Thomas Edison associate Charles Batchelor, which notes it is “the first photograph ever taken by incandescent electric lamps.”
Visit our Digital Collections to see all of these portraits of electrical pioneers, and keep an eye out for more artifacts digitized through the grant to be added over upcoming months.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
Additional Readings:
- Ingersoll-Rand Diesel-Electric Locomotive
- Rotative Steam Engine, 1788
- From Electric Vehicles to the Stars
- Discovering Context with IMLS
20th century, 19th century, power, IMLS grant, electricity, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl
The Ford GT40 race car celebrates some big anniversaries this year and next. In 1966, GT40s finished 1-2-3 at the French endurance race 24 Hours of Le Mans, and in 1967, the Ford Mark IV now on display at The Henry Ford won an all-American victory at the same race, driven by Dan Gurney and A.J. Foyt. In honor of these milestones, we’ve just digitized about 800 color images from the Dave Friedman Collection showing races where GT40s competed, including this lineup from the 24 Hours of Daytona race in February, 1969. Visit our Digital Collections to browse the images by race, including the 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, and 1969 12 Hours of Sebring; the 1966 and 1967 24 Hours of Le Mans; and the 1967, 1968, and 1969 24 Hours of Daytona—and if you want even more GT40, check out the video we just produced telling the dramatic story of our Mark IV and its fabled 1967 win.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
In the late 1880s, German immigrant Engelbert Grimm had a building designed by local architect Peter Dederichs, Jr., which was then built along Michigan Avenue in Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood. Grimm sold and repaired watches, clocks, and jewelry for more than four decades on the ground floor of this building, and lived with his family on the second floor. After the death of the store’s founder, customer Henry Ford acquired both the contents of the store and, later, the building itself, which now stands in Greenfield Village as Grimm Jewelry Store.
We’ve just digitized dozens of photographs from our collections related to the building, including this 1926 interior photo showing Engelbert Grimm hard at work. Visit our Digital Collections to see all of the Grimm Jewelry images.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl, Greenfield Village history, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village
If you’ve visited Henry Ford Museum, you’ve probably seen our collection of Presidential vehicles, which includes a 1972 Lincoln limousine used by Ronald Reagan (notably on the day in 1981 when he was shot by John Hinckley). If you’ve ever wanted to learn more about how this car was originally built, you’re in luck. We recently discovered in our collections a series of detailed photographs documenting the original construction of the Reagan limo by Ford's Special Vehicles Engineering Department, mostly covering the period between August 1970 and October 1971. The early stage image shown here was taken on August 19, 1970. Explore more than 130 additional photos taken during the construction of this historic vehicle by visiting our Digital Collections.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
Additional Readings:
- Presidential Vehicles
- The Henry Ford at Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance
- #InnovationNation: Social Transformation
- Presidential Limousines at The Henry Ford
Ford Motor Company, presidential vehicles, presidents, cars, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl
Because our collections are so vast and predate the computer age, we are always stumbling across interesting artifacts we weren’t expecting to find. We recently rediscovered a set of eight letters sent to writer Frank Dorrance Hopley from various notable personalities in 1921. Hopley hoped to write an article on the “most thrilling moment” in these men’s lives, and had asked them to share those stories. In the letter shown here, James W. Gerard, Ambassador to Germany during World War I, related that his moment was when “the German Kaiser shook his finger in my face”—a thrilling moment indeed. Unfortunately, many of the rest of the letters we located provide less thrilling—but perhaps more amusing—responses: former president William Taft noted his life had not been thrilling and he therefore could not single out any one moment, and Robert Lansing, Secretary of State during World War I, suggested his most thrilling moments were personal ones he did not care to reveal. Not surprisingly, we couldn’t turn up any evidence that Hopley’s article was ever completed. Visit our Digital Collections to read all the letters, including a momentous answer from Thomas Edison.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
communication, archives, 20th century, 1920s, presidents, digital collections, correspondence, by Ellice Engdahl
In 1915, Henry Ford began acquiring property along the Rouge River in southeastern Michigan with the intent of building a vast manufacturing complex, aiming to transform raw materials into parts and those parts into automobiles in the most rapid and efficient possible ways. The first major building on the site was constructed in 1917, but work to extend and expand the Rouge plant and its capabilities continued through the 1920s. We’ve just digitized 119 images taken between February and May 1918 that focus on the construction going on at the Rouge, including many like this one that give a sense of the expansive nature of the endeavor. Visit our Digital Collections to see these Rouge images and others from our Automobile Plant Construction Photographs collection, or learn more about the modern Rouge and how you can see the plant yourself on our visit page.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
digital collections, Ford Rouge Factory Complex, Ford Motor Company, by Ellice Engdahl
This month, we recognize 150 years of a phenomenon that started in Detroit but has become a national icon: Vernors. In 1866, pharmacist James Vernor began serving his zippy ginger ale at his pharmacy’s soda fountain, and it became first a local, then a regional favorite. Today, Vernors is owned by Dr Pepper Snapple Group, a major North American beverage company, and can be found throughout the United States. Many Detroiters retain a particularly strong loyalty to the fizzy concoction, swearing by both its taste and its ability to soothe an upset stomach—so much so that the Detroit Historical Society has organized a week-long anniversary celebration. In recognition of the milestone, we dug through our collections for some Vernors-related artifacts, and turned up labels, signs, photos of delivery trucks, a recipe booklet, and, perhaps most intriguingly, several photos like this one of James Vernor III sitting in a Vernors-branded Ford amphibious jeep. We haven’t yet been able to turn up the full story behind these images, but suspect they might relate to clearing surplus inventory of such vehicles after World War II. We invite you to pop open a refreshing ginger ale of your own and browse the rest of the Vernors-related items we found in our Digital Collections.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
21st century, 20th century, 19th century, Michigan, digital collections, Detroit, by Ellice Engdahl, beverages
Since 1929, The Henry Ford has hosted a steady stream of celebrity visitors, eager to see our iconic artifacts. In 1961, French artist and iconoclast Marcel Duchamp and his wife visited Henry Ford Museum. If you know Duchamp’s history, you might find it an interesting contrast that the man who rejected art that was merely beautiful in favor of art “in the service of the mind” stopped to pose for this photo in front of the Bugatti. The large, luxurious, and beautiful car seems a far cry from “Fountain,” created by Duchamp more than four decades before. We’ve just digitized dozens of images featuring celebrities of all stripes visiting our campus over many decades—browse more by visiting this Expert Set we’ve created within our Digital Collections.
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
Michigan, Dearborn, 20th century, 1960s, luxury cars, Henry Ford Museum, Driving America, digital collections, convertibles, cars, by Ellice Engdahl, art
