Posts Tagged henry ford museum
This is the inaugural post of a new regular feature on The Henry Ford’s blog showcasing an item from the physical collections of The Henry Ford that has been recently added to our digital collections. In addition to an image, we’ll provide a brief bit of background information and links or hints for searching. A lot of the objects we’re digitizing are not currently on display, so in many cases the digital collections are the only way to see them. Please enjoy, and let us know if you have any questions about our digitization efforts.
This week we’ve just added an object that may look familiar to our visitors—this eighteenth-century daybed is currently on display in Henry Ford Museum in the “Fully Furnished” exhibit. View the daybed and over 270 pieces of furniture and related items by visiting our Digital Collections. Let us know if your favorite piece from “Fully Furnished” has been added yet!
Ellice Engdahl is Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford.
Henry Ford Museum, by Ellice Engdahl, furnishings, digital collections
Earlier this summer we were honored to have some of NASCAR's greatest drivers paired with the drivers of tomorrow for a tour across our campus. Take a look at this video as Curator of Transportation Matt Anderson talks about their visits.
Michigan, Dearborn, 21st century, 2010s, racing, race cars, race car drivers, Henry Ford Museum, Ford Motor Company, Driven to Win, cars
When you think of Henry Ford, you think of cars almost immediately. Violins probably don't come to mind, do they? While it may come as a surprise to some today, Henry was a lover of violins and classic American music. He loved the fiddle and country dancing, two things that reminded him of his childhood. Henry could often be found in Lovett Hall dancing with Clara Ford as the band played and dances were called throughout the night.
Henry amassed an impressive collection of violins in the early part of the 20th century. Those violins are now within the collections of The Henry Ford, but occasionally they are loaned to other institutions for exhibition or, in the case of Sphinx, loaned to promising young musicians, like Gareth Johnson, to be played for new audiences. Gareth recently played the 1709 Siberian Stradivarius during our National Day of Courage in February.
In this video, Curator of Domestic Life Jeanine Head Miller shares additional insight on Henry and his violins, and why having someone like Gareth play them today would have made him very proud.
Europe, Michigan, 18th century, 17th century, 20th century, violins, musical instruments, music, Henry Ford Museum, Henry Ford
Visitors to Henry Ford Museum can often be found gathering under the Douglas Auto Theatre “Driving America” sign for photo opportunities and to marvel at the larger-than-life artifact. But recently visitors and racing fans gathered by the sign to honor Henry Ford as a racing innovator.
In honor of what would have been Henry’s 150th birthday on July 30, 2013, Ford brands Motorcraft/Quick Lane and Ford Racing honored his legacy with a special paint scheme in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway July 26-28, 2013 race, with Wood Brothers Racing and driver Trevor Bayne.
The car’s paint scheme features an iconic Henry photo – posed on top of the Sweepstakes with Spider Huff riding on the sideboard, the car that would take him to victory in 1901 at a race track in Grosse Pointe, Mich.
Why was that race so important? To be honest, it was important because Henry already had one business flop on his hands, the Detroit Automobile Company. His win with the Sweepstakes against opponent Alexander Winton not only netted him the $1,000 prize but the investors needed to start Ford Motor Company.
As Henry’s great-grandson, and special guest that morning, Edsel B. Ford II pointed out, if Henry hadn’t won that race, Ford Motor Company might not be here today to celebrate the innovator.
In addition to Edsel, the Wood Brothers and driver Trevor Bayne were on hand to unveil the special car in Henry Ford Museum that morning, sharing some of their appreciation for Henry and his body of work.
While all of the morning’s guests were more than familiar with the collections of The Henry Ford, Trevor and the Wood Brothers are especially familiar and proud as their No. 21 2011 Ford Fusion Stock Car is in our Car Court, currently on loan to us. As Trevor pointed out his former car to the audience, while showing off his tuxedo-themed racing suit for the Brickyard race, he commented, “It’s pretty cool that they’re still celebrating his (Henry) birthday 150 years later!”
We like to think it’s pretty cool, too. Here’s to 150 years of celebrating our founder, Henry Ford, both on AND off the race track.
Michigan, Indiana, 20th century, 1900s, 21st century, 2010s, racing, race cars, race car drivers, Indy 500, Henry Ford Museum, Henry Ford, Ford Motor Company, events, Driven to Win
Monumental Enterprise: Our Artifacts, an Exhibit, a Digital Story, a Partnership
As we digitize the collections of The Henry Ford, we try to find and tell complete stories—for example, we don’t just digitize the race car, but also trophies it won, and photos from some of its most famous races. Because of our broad collecting approach and the resultant depth of our collections, we uncover these stories all the time.
Sometimes fate and/or current events help us out. Though The Henry Ford is an independent institution, we do maintain a warm relationship with Ford Motor Company and often work together on projects. Recently we discovered a series of items in our collection that played a big role in Ford Motor Company’s history, both nearly 90 years ago and again just six years ago.
The items include a number of paintings, magazine advertisement proofs created from those (and other) paintings, and correspondence that formed an impressive ad campaign. The campaign itself consisted of 16 ads that ran in the Saturday Evening Post and other magazines in 1924 and 1925. The ads, two-page spreads that contained both visually arresting artwork and a significant amount of text, explained the backstory of the Ford company at a time when, as Marc Greuther, Chief Curator and Curator of Industry and Design at The Henry Ford, states, the company was at “a certain kind of pinnacle” with their signature product, the Model T, but “the product is slipping.”
As fascinating as it is, this ad campaign might have disappeared into relative obscurity if it hadn’t been rediscovered by Ford Motor Company’s new President and CEO, Alan Mulally, in 2007. In a recent interview with Fast Company, Mulally said, “I was looking for a compelling vision, a comprehensive statement to deliver that strategy.” This ad campaign from the previous century provided just the fundamental sense of purpose that Mulally was after, and allowed him to create a new strategic vision that was embraced across Ford Motor Company.
As we discussed this backstory with Ford Motor Company, both organizations were extremely interested in highlighting the ad campaign. Marc Greuther conducted a one-on-one interview with Alan Mulally about the impact the earlier campaign had on today’s Ford Motor Company (you can view clips from that interview here and here). As discussions continued between our institutions, the Ford Motor Company Fund generously provided a grant to conserve and reframe some of the materials, as well as create videos covering the conservation process and interviews. We made plans to highlight some of the newly conserved paintings within our Driving America exhibit. The new exhibit was officially unveiled on June 24, with Alan Mulally and other luminaries (including Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, who checked in at the Museum on Foursquare) in attendance.
The interactive kiosk within this section of the exhibit was updated to include new video clips featuring Marc Greuther’s interview with Alan Mulally, as well as additional analysis of the campaign by Marc. It also now features an electronic collections set containing all of the paintings, ad proofs, and correspondence connected to the campaign, as well as other related materials.
In case you’ve ever wondered what it takes to pull this kind of historical story together, in both physical and digital formats, here are some of the groups that played a role:
It certainly took a lot of time, effort, and funding to put this all together, but we hope you’ll agree that the resulting exhibit in Driving America within the Museum—as well as the digital assets, available to anyone around the world—are worth it. Let us know what you think.
Ellice Engdahl, Digital Collections & Content Manager at The Henry Ford, is always trying to integrate the physical and the digital.
correspondence, art, paintings, 21st century, 20th century, technology, research, Henry Ford Museum, Ford Motor Company, Driving America, digitization, by Ellice Engdahl, advertising, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
On this day 117 years ago, Henry Ford took a very special test drive. He took his Quadricycle out for a spin for the very first time. Henry sold his first car for $200. What did the money go toward? Building his second car.
Learn more about Henry the engineer on our special website dedicated to our founder and ultimate maker.
(Object ID: P.833.89114)
Driving America, Henry Ford Museum, cars, Henry Ford, quadricycle
Located in the front of Henry Ford Museum is Anderson Theater. The theater plays a variety of roles today, from a space for presentations to wedding ceremonies. Regular visitors might be familiar with the theater, but here’s a bit of Anderson Theater production history.
Originally named the Henry Ford Museum Theater, it was built in 1929. Since the opening of the museum drama has been performed on Anderson’s stage, first done by the Edison Institute students. A professional theater program began in 1964 under the direction of Ted Payne.
In September of 1965, Joseph French took over the theater department and became the new producer, a position he held until the program ended in 1995. The first actual production was during the holidays in 1965 – “Rip Van Winkle.” An annual Easter production began in 1972 and ran through 1982. Finishing out the 1970s, the American comedy series began in 1976. The first full subscription season of evening shows (and select matinees) began in 1978 and ran through December 1995. Holiday plays ended at the end of December, 2004.
The theater was renovated in 1994 and re-named the Sally and Wendell Anderson Theater because of their generous donation to the theater. (Sally and Wendell were long supporters of The Henry Ford. Wendell served on our board of trustees from 1982-1993.) This renovation provided the theater with refurbish restrooms, developed the dressing rooms, along with new carpet, and upholstery for the seats.
The first play that was held after Anderson Theater was re-opened was “The Witching Hour”
Today Anderson is a popular spot for wedding ceremonies at The Henry Ford thanks to the stage and theater-style seating. A fun trend we’ve seen from couples from time to time is to turn Anderson Theater wedding invitations into tickets or playbills to celebrate the theater’s history. After all, as the history of Anderson Theater will tell you, the play's the thing!
Aileen Lessnau is a Social Event Specialist at The Henry Ford
events, by Aileen Lessnau, Henry Ford Museum, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford
Donna Braden, Curator of Public Life, had the pleasure of delving into our vast collections to develop the “Ford at the Fair” display, our complement to the traveling exhibition “Designing Tomorrow” that is currently in Henry Ford Museum. Take a trip back in time with her in today's blog post as we head to to the fair.
Welcome to the Ford Building at Chicago’s Century of Progress Exposition here in the year 1934! We hope that our exhibits will inform and inspire you, along with the millions of other visitors we expect to attend the fair and see our exhibits this year. Henry Ford has a passion for world’s fairs and he is always enthusiastic about showing the public how we do things at Ford Motor Company.
How far we’ve come since Mr. Ford invented his first car, the Quadricycle. And although we are currently deep in an economic depression, our exhibits will surely impress upon you how busy we are developing new products for your current and future enjoyment.
We are proud to boast the largest corporate exhibition at the Century of Progress Exposition this year—11 acres in all! Our stunning Exposition Building was designed by Albert Kahn, who has designed many buildings for us, including the exceptional Ford River Rouge Plant. Mr. Kahn cleverly planned the circular court in the center of our Exposition Building to simulate a graduated cluster of gears.
Now come inside for a closer look at how our exhibits present the fascinating story of the Ford motor car.
First off, you’ll see our centerpiece exhibit, “Ford Industries Cover the World.” This huge rotating globe identifies the locations of our company’s production plants around the world. Our company is truly international in its reach.
Circling the outer edge of the center court we present “The Drama of Transportation,” showing the evolution of horse-drawn and horseless carriages leading all the way up to our modern 1934 Ford V-8.
Now let’s turn left and enter the smaller wing of the building. Here you’ll find the “Henry Ford Century Room,” celebrating 100 years of mechanical progress. This room includes early electric generators brought here from Mr. Ford’s growing collection at his museum in Dearborn, Mich., along with his first workshop and his first car.
Beyond this room you’ll see exhibits reflecting Mr. Ford’s interest in bringing together agriculture and industry, particularly his passion for growing and processing soybeans for car manufacturing. Mr. Ford even staged an all-soybean meal here recently, where he invited 30 reporters to partake of several specially made dishes. The reporters were not so sure about soybeans in their food but they had to admit that the future of soybean-based plastics, paint, and oil looks bright!
Now let’s head over to the large wing on the other side of our Exposition Building. Here we have many exhibits that showcase our modern industrial practices.
For example, inspired by Mr. Ford’s passionate interest in using natural materials to manufacture car parts, our “Out of the Earth” exhibit demonstrates how natural resources—like iron, aluminum, rubber, asbestos, and of course soybeans—go into the making of specific parts of the Ford V-8, mounted on top as a cutaway view.
Farther down this wing, you can see the amazing “Proof of Safety” exhibit. Here three Ford V-8’s are suspended from the rim of a welded steel wheel of the type used on all our Ford V-8 cars. This should assure you of the strength and dependability of the modern cars we are producing.
While you’re touring the many exhibits and demonstrations at the Ford Exposition building today, be sure to visit our impressive “Roads of the World” display outside. This large oval track features 100-foot-long sections that resemble 19 world-famous thoroughfares, ranging from the earliest Roman roads to the smooth paved highways of today.
Alas, our time is up. We hope you enjoyed your brief tour today, and are as excited as we are about the bright future we all have ahead of us.
Thank you for visiting and come back soon!
A complete gallery of items used in this display can be viewed at Ford at the Fair Exhibition.
Illinois, 20th century, 1930s, world's fairs, manufacturing, Henry Ford Museum, Henry Ford, Ford Motor Company, events, cars, by Donna R. Braden, agriculture
Last month, staff and volunteers from car museums across the United States gathered in Lincoln, Neb., for the 2013 Annual Conference of the National Association of Automobile Museums (NAAM). The three-day meeting offers a chance to reconnect with friends and colleagues, visit interesting collections, and commiserate on the latest happenings in the world of car museums.
Our host in Lincoln was the fantastic Smith Collection Museum of American Speed. Founded in 1992 by “Speedy” Bill and Joyce Smith (the proprietors of Speedway Motors, among the country’s top performance parts dealers), the museum’s great strength is its collection of early American race cars and 300+ race engines. The Smith team treated us to a wonderful “all access” evening in their 135,000 square-foot facility.
Conference sessions covered everything from fundamentals (museum mission statements and strategic plans) to esoteric details only a curator or registrar could love (proper file formats and sizes for the digital imaging of museum collections). As always, vehicle preservation was a hot topic, and The Henry Ford’s Senior Conservator Clara Deck presented on her efforts in preparing cars for our Driving America exhibit.
And speaking of Driving America - The highlight of any NAAM conference is the award ceremony that wraps it all up. Each year NAAM recognizes select programs, publications and exhibits that represent the best in American automobile museums. I’m proud to report that, this year, the judges selected Driving America for the NAAMY Award of Excellence for Interpretive Exhibits. It’s a wonderful honor, and we are grateful to our colleagues for the recognition.
Matt Anderson is Curator of Transportation at The Henry Ford
At The Henry Ford, Conservation’s job is to maintain artifacts as close to original condition as possible while also ensuring access. The Dymaxion House is a fairly fragile aluminum structure, and a very popular exhibit, which makes preservation a little bit of a challenge.
Last year we did some rather major surgery on the Dymaxion House. We opened up the floor and patched all 96 aluminum floor beams to reinforce them where many had developed cracks.
As I explained in past blog posts, linked below, the damages were found primarily on the heavy-traffic side of the house, where our guests walk through. The repair job in 2012 took two months of hard work.
After all that effort, how do we ensure that this kind of damage won’t progress?
This year we are setting up some cool monitoring devices that will help us understand the house better.
All metal structures move. We want to figure out how our beams are moving, and whether the structure can continue to withstand the forces we apply to it.
Under the guidance of our own engineer, Richard Jeryan, who is retired from Ford Motor Company, and with the generous assistance of Ford Senior Chassis Test Engineer Dave Friske and two skilled technicians, Instrumentation Expert Walter Milewsky and Fastener Lab Technician Richard Talbott, we are installing stress and strain gauges along with crack detection and propagation gauges.
These gauges are the kind of very precise instrument used by engineers to find out how structures perform. They are used to test automobile parts (even ones as small as bolts) during design, and are also used on buildings and bridges.
Strain gauges are used to measure the amount of deformation (strain) when a building is loaded. Put another way, stress is a measurement of the load on a material, strain is a measure of the change in the shape of the object that is undergoing stress. We will be recording a baseline stress on the beams with the house empty of people and collecting our strain data on a busy week in the museum (like the Fouth of July!).
The crack detection gauges will alert us to a crack that is starting, and the propagation gauges will tell us how quickly a new crack is progressing.
These tiny devices are glued onto the beams and wires soldered onto them so that electrical resistance can be monitored with special equipment. Engineers gather the electrical resistance data and use formulas to calculate the degree and character of stress. We are applying the gauges in a number of locations to gather the best overall picture of how the beams move.
We also measured the deflection of the structural wire “cage” using a fancy laser-level and we recorded the data. This will enable us to compare yearly readings during our annual inspection to determine how the cage may be moving.
This is science and technology – working for preservation.
Clara Deck is a Senior Conservator at The Henry Ford.
Additional Readings:
- Dymaxion House
- Curating & Preserving: The Dymaxion House
- Learning about "The House of the Future"
- Dymaxion House at its 1948-1991 Site, near Andover, Kansas
technology, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford, conservation, collections care, Henry Ford Museum, by Clara Deck, Dymaxion House, Buckminster Fuller
