& a walk back in time

okay, so as I was saying in my last post, off we went to Greenfield Village & Henry Ford Museum in Detroit, unfortunately the camera got left behind, so you'll have to make do with these photos off their website. [update: there are now a few from our friend's camera in here as well] We started with the Village, and we were greeted with free Panera samples before we even crossed through the front gate: slushy lemonade, cinnamon raisin french toast and asiago bread. Yum!

After we entered we took a stroll down Main Street and it really was like we had entered a different time--the turn-of the 20th century to be exact. There was a whole different atmosphere...all the simple stores and housefronts, people dressed in clothes from the late 1800s, horse drawn carriages and buggies, Model T cars, a man on a funny bicycle that had a very large front wheel. Most of the homes and buildings were taken apart piece by piece from their original location, numbered, brought here by Henry Ford and put back together like a puzzle. He wanted to preserve this time in history. They have farmers and craftsmen that all use the same techniques that they did back then. We saw one guy planting tobacco on these little mounds in a field. He was dressed in long sleeves, suspenders and a wide straw hat. We felt sorry for him as we were sweating in our shorts and t-shirts.

As we moseyed our way through town we stopped at a millinery shop where a lady told us about the hats that were on display and how they were quite expensive--about $3, or a month's salary for most people. Often people who had a good straw hat would just get the trimmings redone for a third of the price. They had small hats for the children to try on as well. We stopped at a tintype studio and our friends took a picture of the kids, we stopped at a jewelry store that was from downtown Detroit. The storekeeper told us all about how everyone wore jewelry back then. They even put little pins on the babies clothes that said, "Baby," or "Pet," or "Darling." They had some pins like these there, as well as a ton of pocket watches for men. There were all kinds of chains for the pocket watches, including ones that looked like finely woven rope. It turns out that these were made from women's hair! Men would get them made from a lock of their sweetheart's hair, and then when they traveled she would always be with him. Sweet, but a little creepy too, I thought. :) There was some gaudy black beaded jewelry too. He said this was for women to wear with their black clothes for their 12 month period of mourning if their husband or father died. Men only mourned for a month, cause they had to get back to work and get a new wife to take care of all their children. If their wife had an unmarried sister, it was often her. Definitely different ideas about love and marriage!

The kids loved seeing all the horses, getting to ride in a Model T car, and probably their favorite part was riding on the carousel. It was a beautiful one that was made in 1913. Everything was, of course, hand carved and the horses had tails made of real horse hair. When Henry Ford found this carousel, he had everything taken off that wasn't original and everything else restored. I loved the music player in the middle. It was a huge box that seemed to work like a player piano, but it also had a cymbal and a couple drums with little drumsticks that it operated as well.

One of my other favorites was when we stopped by the Wright Brother's home. Henry Ford moved it here from Ohio so we could walk through it, as well as the bicycle shop they owned, where they built the Wright Flyer in the back room. The best part was the actors that played the parts of the two brothers and one of their sisters. They told about their upbringing and how they ended up finding success at Kitty Hawk. It was fascinating!

Henry Ford actually dedicated the village to his friend and mentor, Thomas Edison. There was a statue of Edison, as well as his homes and laboratories, where we saw his phonograph and some of his original lightbulbs.

A real working steam engine travels around the 200 acre village. The kids were thrilled when we went for a ride on it. We were glad we sat in the back as it puffed out tons of black smoke from the coal. On our train ride we passed a baseball game where there were no baseball mitts, the pitch was underhand and when our train went by, they paused their game and yelled "huzzah!" to us.We could have spent a ton more time in the village--we didn't even get to see the craftsman area--glass blowing and pottery and spinning and the like. But, we only had an hour left before it all closed, so we headed to the museum.

At the museum, Isabelle was riding on her daddy's shoulders and she actually fell asleep up there with her head balanced precariously on top of his head! Alex also fell asleep in the stroller. The rest of us really enjoyed scratching the surface of this amazing museum. In the very front are the presidential limousines from Roosevelt, Eisenhower, JFK (yes, the one he was shot in!) and Reagan (the one that saved him from John Hinkley's bullet). Apparently there will not be any more vehicles added to this exhibit in the future as all presidential cars are now destroyed by the Secret Service for security reasons! We also saw the rocking chair that Abraham Lincoln was shot in! And one of my favorites...we got to climb aboard the bus and and sit in the same seat as Rosa Parks when she made her stand for freedom and equality. As we sat on the bus, a man told us the story, and I loved that Emma was there learning about this. I think Emma's favorite part was sitting in Miley Cyrus' car--or at least one she used in one of her concerts. :)We got to climb into the cab and pull the levers in one of the largest steam-powered trains ever made, weighing in at 603 tons! There was a replica of the Wright Flyer, and oodles of other trains, planes, cars, motorcycles, RVs, and horse-drawn carriages and coaches.
I loved the furniture displays, especially one of the tables that I found out later was Mrs. Abraham Lincoln's. The chest of drawers in the photo belonged to the mother of George Washington. There were also beautiful dollhouses, and rooms set-up to represent how a typical kitchen evolved from the year 1700 to 1930.

When we got home, I had two beyond tired legs, and 5 hungry tired kids, but it was definitely worth it! If you enjoy interactive history, this is a must-see!