June 30 -- The Henry Ford

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On June 29, I visited my oldest friend at the Henry Ford.  She has worked there for many years, and is a fount of information about the various collections, and about the way the artifacts are moved on and off display, and about the way decisions are made as to what is displayed, and how.  Walking around with her makes the experience of visiting the museum much richer!

The first thing that caught my eye on the 29th was this Eames chair.  My parents are big fans of modern design.  I bet if they still had those iron lamps with the parchment? shades, they'd be worth a pretty penny........

They had a handsome knock-off of the Eames chair in their living room for decades, until the parts that allowed the chair to swivel gave up the ghost, and replacements could not be found.

As you would expect of a collection assembled by Henry Ford, manufacture of items is one of the key themes.  The museum has an "exploded" version of the Eames chair -- all the pieces, suspended in air, showing where they would go when the chair was assembled.

Pretty cool -- this next view looks like an art piece to me.........

They also have much older furniture........  C. and I talked a little about our own personal taste, and about things we could appreciate but would not want, and about things we could not really appreciate (and certainly would not want).  I like looking at this next piece, but wouldn't want it.

There was a special exhibit on women in rock music, on loan from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.  This giant guitar was one of my favorite things from that exhibit.

No picture-taking allowed in the exhibit itself, alas.  Lots and lots of photographs of women who sang and played Rock&Roll, and some singers from Rhythm&Blues (before there was Rock&Roll).  I knew a lot more names (and a lot more history) than I would have known, had I not taken "A History of Rock" and "Music's Big Bang" on Coursera.............  The exhibit had lots of the garments worn by the various performers when on stage.  Some interesting design, and a lot of spangles!  There was also video of different performers singing.  It was fun to see.



The first "computer cards" were used to tell looms which warp threads to lift in what sequence.

Jacquard looms enabled very complicated patterns to be woven much more quickly than if a person had to continually make decisions about which threads should be lifted (one by one) by hand.  I expect it's possible for a person to weave the pattern below by hand, but it was much easier with a Jacquard loom!

People talk about "the real McCoy" -- did you know he was a real man?  He had dozens of patents, many of which were for devices that would keep various parts of locomotive engines lubricated.

A closeup.  I believe it says "Elijah McCoy.  Specification for improvement (?) apparatus (?) oiling slide valves.  Filed Mar. 12 1887."

Another topic C. and I talked about is design aesthetics as applied to machinery.  Not just functional, but embellished..........  I don't know what this is (I was very bad about reading the informative material for the things I looked at.....).

What ever it is, it has a bird.  In some foliage.  With red paint.

Of course there are cars, cars, cars, cars, and more cars.  To my eye this is comical.  That exaggerated front looks like a cartoon car to me.  Cruella DeVille's car, maybe?

And now for something completely different -- I believe I have stayed in this room!  And not 40 years ago, neither.

Only when we were there, the carpet was red with black, and there was a microwave.............

Two years ago when it was so hot, and the power went off, we went and spent the night in a Red Roof, because the Red Roof, bless them, would let us bring the dog.  For all practical purposes, this is the room we stayed in.....................

This room, now in the museum, was originally part of a Holiday Inn.  C. pointed out to me that when Holiday Inn wanted to upgrade, they sold their older properties to less-expensive chains, and built new facilities.  That makes sense, but I'd never thought about it.......

I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that the Red Roof we stayed in two years ago was once a Holiday Inn.  I don't remember the concrete-block wall between the rooms, but I think we had the "wood" paneling on the side of the bathroom, and the arrangement of the room was identical to this..............

I believe I've stayed in this room, too, or something pretty similar............  This one was a stand-alone cabin, at least a generation older than the Holiday Inn room.  I don't remember the wood stove, and I'm pretty sure we never stayed in a room that didn't have its own bathroom........  Anything like this that I stayed in would have been decades ago, rather than a couple of years...........

Non-car transportation.

Here's where we had lunch!  Not only is the diner in the middle of the museum, but it is a functioning diner!

The little booths inside were full, alas.  (They are on the right side of the diner -- you can see one person's head just to the right of the doorway.)  There were booths out here on the patio in front of the diner (still inside the museum), and we decided to sit out here, and spare our backs by not sitting at the counter.

They have actual menus from the diner as part of the collection, so they know that the offerings are (for the most part) authentic.  (A brand-name iced tea in plastic bottles -- not so much.)

My tuna salad, with potato salad.  My friend's chips (which I thought were amusing for the "Original!" blazoned across the front).

This was much more substantial bread than Wonder Bread would have been, but had a very machine-made look.  I hadn't eaten bread like this in a long time (a very long time), but I was amused to see it.

I thought it was very fun to eat just what I could have eaten at the diner back in the 50s and 60s when it was "out in the wild" rather than in a museum collection.

I wonder what the prices were, back then...........

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