I just received a note from Nathan Ayers, the guy who won the first $1,000 grant from A2Awesome. He wanted to let me know that, back in 1984, the television program PM Magazine ran a feature on Harry Bennett’s fortress on the banks of the Huron River, in Ypsilanti. Bennett, for those of you don’t […]
Tag Archives: Greenfield Village
Walking the secret passageways of Harry Bennett’s heavily-fortified Ypsilanti castle
Posted in A2Awesome, History, Ypsilanti Also tagged anti-Semitic, automotive industry, Battle of the Overpass, castles, Charles Coughlin, Communism, exotic animals, FDR, fear of Communism, Flint, Ford Hunger March, Ford Motor Company, Ford Service Department, Ford's Service Department, General Motors, Great Depression, Harry Bennett, Harry Bennett's Castle, Henry Ford, Hilter, Huron River, industrial revolution, labor history, lions, mansions, manufacturing, middle class, murder, Nathan Ayers, New Deal, PM Magazine, private armies, race baiting, River Rouge, safe house, secret passageways, strike breaking, threats to the middle class, tigers, turrets, union busting, Walter Reuther 36 Comments
Detroit 2011 Maker Faire
I spent a good part of the day today stumbling around in the heat at the Detroit Maker Faire. Among other things, I did the following… I got to see an incredibly cool demonstration of a turn-of-the-century steam-powered threshing machine put on by the employees of Greenfield Village. I visited the HackPittsburgh yurt, and, while […]
Posted in Art and Culture, Detroit, entrepreneurism, Other, Uncategorized Also tagged Amelia marks, Backyard Brains, brain activity, chaff, Cheez Whiz, cockroaches, Electrophysiology, farming, high altitude balloons, invention, Maker Faire, neurons, Professor Frink, Ruth Marks, Science, SpikerBox, the brain, The Simpsons, thrashing, wheat 10 Comments
Edison, Tesla, electrocuted elephants, and the hiding place beneath the stairs
I spent the day with my parents at the Henry Ford museum, experiencing secondhand the hero worship that the great automotive entrepreneur felt for Thomas Edison. We listened to recordings of Edison speaking, contemplated his dying breath under glass and saw the spot under the stairs of hisMenlo Park laboratory (which had been moved from […]
Posted in energy, Ideas, OCD, Other, Science, Special Projects Also tagged Ford, free power, Google, Henry Ford, innovation, Jesus, Mark Twain, Menlo Park, muckers, Nikola Tesla, people to bring back from the dead, space elevator, Thomas Edison, Thomas Jefferson, Topsy, War of Currents, Wardenclyffe 9 Comments