It’s that time of year again, and Old Car Festival inside The Henry Ford’s Greenfield Village is the place to see Ford Model As. The beloved automobile will make up almost a quarter of the sweet rides on display this year. But wait, Old Car Festival covers 42 years of vehicles, 1890-1932, so why are there so many from the four years the Model A was produced? After some research and talking with our Curator of Transportation Matt Anderson, here’s why. Continue Reading

1930s, 1920s, 20th century, Old Car Festival, Greenfield Village, Ford Motor Company, events, cars, car shows, by Sarah R. Kornacki

 

 

Later this month the first episode of our new television series, The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation, will debut on CBS as part of the Saturday morning Dream Team programming block. Members and visitors to The Henry Ford will recognize a familiar building in the first episode: Thomas Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory.

We've collected a handful of our digital resources for you to immerse yourself in. Make sure to check the blog every week this fall for more episode resource posts.

Lish Dorset is Social Media Manager at The Henry Ford. Continue Reading

by Lish Dorset, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, Thomas Edison, The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation

 

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technology, books, electricity, Thomas Edison, by Marc Greuther, Greenfield Village history, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village

One-Room School is one of The Henry Ford’s longest-running programs. It has made memories for generations; current teachers and staff members remember coming to Greenfield Village for this program as children themselves. And now we have revised our One-Room School Teacher’s Guide to update the program.

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teachers and teaching, school, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, educational resources, education, by Catherine Tuczek

Barns are one of the best ways to tell where you are when you are traveling—especially if you happened to be traveling through the United States 150 years ago.

Barns are generally the largest man-made feature of the rural landscape. They can tell you a lot about the type of farming that is going on, as well as the cultural background of the family that built them. Unlike houses or commercial buildings, barns generally lack stylistic adornment. Since building a barn was often a community undertaking, the general form and the details of barn construction often changed slowly—barn-builders were limited to construction techniques that everyone in the community knew how to do. As a result, until the late 1800s, barns tended to differ more from place-to-place, than they did over time.

The barn at the Firestone Farm tells us that the Firestone family was of German ancestry, that people from the Germanic sections of Pennsylvania settled the community where the family lived in Ohio, and that their farm was the typical mix of livestock and grain crops found in the northeast and upper Midwestern United States.

What physical clues tell us this?

The Firestone barn is of a type known as a Pennsylvania-German bank barn, or “Sweitzer” barn, one of the primary barn types found in the United States before 1880. Bank barns are large, multi-purpose structures that combined several farm functions under a single roof. Two-story and rectangular in form, they have a gable roof with a ridgeline running the length of the building. They are called bank barns because one side of the barn is built into the bank of a hill, allowing wagons to be driven into the upper floor of the barn. The opposite side of the barn has an overhang, known as a projecting forebay. Livestock were kept in the lower story of the barn. Continue Reading

by Jim McCabe, farms and farming, agriculture, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village

We are continuing on our summer project with intern Molly Malcolm to digitize photographs and other materials related to the structures in Greenfield Village.  Over the last few weeks, it’s been the turn of Farris Windmill, originally constructed in Cape Cod, Massachusetts in the mid-seventeenth century.  This photograph, which appears to capture a newspaper clipping, shows that not every community wanted Henry Ford to purchase and relocate their architectural treasures to Dearborn.  On a cheerier note, you can also review close to 100 images showing crowds of Ford dealers at the dedication of the windmill in the Village, and some surprisingly atmospheric shots of the windmill in its earlier locations.  Visit our Digital Collections to see more items related to Farris Windmill.

Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.

power, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl

In the classic baseball movie, The Natural, one of Roy Hobbs’ (played by Robert Redford) most memorable lines comes as he is sitting in a hospital bed, realizing that his final game is just days away.

“God, I love baseball,” Hobbs declares softly with a tilt of his head and a sincere look in his eyes that tells you how much he really means it. Watching that scene, you know Hobbs doesn’t care about the money that can be made playing baseball. He only cares about the pure joy of playing.

Well, Roy Hobbs would certainly fit right in with those who play Historic Base Ball at Greenfield Village. Continue Reading

Greenfield Village, events, by Kevin Kennedy, sports, baseball, Historic Base Ball

As we mentioned last week, we have been digitizing selections from our collections that relate to topics that will be featured on our brand-new TV show, The Henry Ford’s Innovation Nation.  We’ve just digitized dozens of artifacts related to the H.J. Heinz Company, including this image of a turn-of-the-century exhibition booth.  Follow up a visit to the Heinz House in Greenfield Village by perusing elaborate store displays of Heinz products, streetcar advertising posters, and images of food production. Browse all of our digital Heinz collections in our Digital Collections, and learn more about Heinz on Innovation Nation in the fall!

Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.

food, The Henry Ford's Innovation Nation, Heinz, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl

Many people are familiar with the numerous literary connections at Greenfield Village: poet Robert Frost, lexicographer Noah Webster, and textbook author William Holmes McGuffey. But a little known literary relationship is that between Sir John Bennett, a clock and watchmaker and jeweler--whose storefront was moved from London, England to Greenfield Village in 1931--and one of his most prestigious customers, author Charles Dickens. Continue Reading

1860s, 1850s, Europe, 19th century, Sir John Bennett, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, by James Moffet, books

When you enter Armington & Sims Machine Shop in Greenfield Village, you feel like you are entering a truly historic building. However, as intern Molly Malcom notes, A&S is a building that was constructed onsite between 1928 and 1930 in honor of Pardon Armington and Gardiner Sims, who built steam engines for Thomas Edison in the Rhode Island factory A&S was modeled after. The authentic feel comes from original records, equipment, furniture, and parts that were acquired from a former A&S employee and now populate the building. As part of an ongoing project, we have digitized some of our images of the original facility, including this interior shot, and related people. View these photos and other collections related to Armington & Sims on our collections website.

Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.

Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, digital collections, by Ellice Engdahl