Rich Horton and I leave early on October 1 for our trip to the Henry Ford Museum. Our purpose is to prepare for the overnight workshop for Rivers, Roads & Rails scheduled for November 15 & 16. It takes us almost three hours for the trip. We arrive early, giving us time to explore before our 11:30 meeting.
We listen as our hosts explain possibilities for our trip in November. We like the idea of essential and non-essential elements along the highway. After 60 minutes of brainstorming, we tour the museum. We enjoy the current display of how the automobile changed the landscape of America.
We continue our meeting during lunch. We map out our plan for the rest of the day. Rich and I decide to tour Greenfield Village and then, take the last tour of the day at the Rouge plant.
The rain does not dampen our spirits. Greenfield Village contains 88 houses to visit. We are especially interested in the Model T part that contains the home of Henry Ford, and the home of the Wright Brothers. We have a great time listening to the historical interpreters. My favorite part, however, is riding in a Model T through the village. Rich and I each take our own cars so that we can ride in the front seat and hear what our driver has to tell us. My driver is amazing. He knows the village so well, and he tells me things that no one else knows.
On the way to the Rouge Plant, Rich and I continue to refine plans for our visit. The Rouge Plant is amazing. I am not prepared for what we witness. We love it. We stay until the very last minute, and then we catch the bus back to the Henry Ford Museum.
We agree to rest for an hour and then have dinner...but we can hardly rest. Rich calls me and we go to dinner early. We plan and plan. We revise our plans, and Rich agrees to e-mail Dorothy with our new plan. We agree to meet early for breakfast to check out hotels in the area.
Rich calls me before the time we'd agreed to meet ...and we go to breakfast. We whittle our hotel list to three or four. We check out of our hotel and visit the Best Western, which is the hotel closest to the Henry Ford Museum. The Best Western has everything we want...conference room, restaurant, hot breakfast. We decide that this is the place we will stay.
On the way back to Ohio, Rich and I listen to two Cd's of coal music. We talk about the life of coal miners and other immigrants who built our country. We talk about all that we learned in our meetings and our explorations. We build our lesson plan, and we agree to time lines and responsibilities.
We are excited about all that we have learned and all that we will have to offer our participants. We know that our participants will enjoy the trip and learn new and important details about the automobile and the roads.
I will write a full report after we complete our workshop.
