Henry Ford Museum, Detroit, Michigan

Detroit was somewhat on the way to Chicago, so we made a stop at the Henry Ford Museum to learn about the Industrial Revolution.

This is a museum with a large collection of cars, campers, engines, baseball memorabilia, and much more that will leave you feeling great about America.

We went specifically to see Bucky Fuller's Dymaxion House, which is sort of a combination of a yurt and an Airstream trailer, 1,017 square feet of modern living space. It is made of airplane parts which can be assembled in "2 days by 10 men." This is the only one of its kind, and was donated by the only family to actually live in a Dymaxion House.

Seeing this house alone made the admission price worth it, but we had a couple of hours to kill so we wandered around the giant steam engines for a while. The size of these engines blew our minds, and for the first time I understood how dangerous it was to work in a factory.

My other favorite, and somewhat random, exhibit, was a 1928 Model A car driven from Punta Arenas, Chile to Detroit. The placard described father and son team Hector Quevedo Abarzua and Hugo Quevedo Liberona as having a "lifelog dream of visiting the Henry Ford Museum". It took them 2 years and they made it by staying in shelters and receiving donations. Currently they are in Detroit, raising funds to drive back. Take what you will from that.

There is also a very nice exhibit on Time and Timepieces, which caused me to add another destination to our list, Sunwatch Village in Dayton, Ohio, which is a restored 800 year old circular village, which is basically a sun dial. Perhaps on the way back.

Admission to the museum is $14, plus a $5 parking fee. We printed coupons from their website which gave us a $10 discount. M and I both feel that this was a good deal and the afternoon well spent.