American Precsion Museum, is one such place. It is housed in an old New England mill building, and is devoted to the preservation and explantion of a momentous concept in our history. The idea that guns (Products) should be made with standard parts, mass produced and interchangeable. This new process began here in New England, by a number of gun producers. This museum reports that Eli Whitney has lots of competition from a number competing gun producers for the ownership of the idea. They do an excellent job of showing the machine tools that the gun producers used. Then demonstrated to us the other products that benefited from the concept of interchangeable parts, from typewriters to cars, and almost every product that is manufactured.
While this museum is devoted to the concept of interchangeable parts, we started off with a miniature representation of custom made work. A German immigrant built models of common machine tools, boring machines, lathes, mills, etc. 1/16 size. Yes those are standard size bricks in the background. He built these and stored them in his parents house in Germany. He came to the US, and then after the war, returned home and found his models preserved by his parents, brought them to the US, and began to work on more. They had 30-40 of them, each one a representation of precision.
They had an example of every type of machine tool that would be in shops. the one pictured here is a lathe, made for turning cylinders.
They also had a more modern machine shop in the center staffed by a young intern, who was a student at a local trade school. Here he demonstrated various machines for us, making a wine glass for Liz smaller than her thumbnail. Nicely done.
We stopped and ate in the Windsor Diner a little roadside dining car produced by the Worcester Diner Car Co. Left the camera in the Truck.
We headed off to the Simon Pearce Glassblowers. I had no idea what to expect, but the guidebook said they offered glassblowing and pottery making demonstrations. We started off at their headquarters location, which had a store showing their pottery and glass. Looked very nice, very durable, and veeerrrry expensive. But we persevered.
They had a video running in the store where Simon told the story of how he began making pottery in his fathers shop, studied throughout Europe, and moved to America in 1981. Those of you who were with us last year when we found Marika's dairy, and Gouda cheese shop will see some similarity here. Simon, like Marika, found that despite succsess selling his pottery and glass, the laws and taxes in Ireland were too restrictive. He came to America to find a place
where he could build a glass making and pottery, in a nice little community, beautiful scenery, like home, and be self sufficient in energy costs. He came to Queeche VT.We toured the pottery. He has about 20 potters throwing, molding and building his dishes, bowls and other pieces of pottery. They allowed us out on the shop floor to walk around and ask questions of the potters. As we chatted , I found myself beginning to admire Simon for the way he ran his company. He was in the video saying all the right business jargon, but I've been on enough factory floors to know that a lot gets lost between the CEO's office and the shop.I was starting to like this guy.
They weren't blowing glass at this shop. because a furnace was down for repair, but everybody said we had to see the Queeche facility, 20 min north. so we did. This is actually the back of his shop. It shows the beautiful restaurant he built over the river, with his shops selling the glassware and pottery in the brick building behind, where the people are standing.
In the wood building is the glass blowers, and below that his power plant. Here is the Generato
r he put in. They had to excavate from where I'm standing down to the bottom of the generator you see here, and then go another 30' below that for the sluice way. this was a major project! He originally sold all the power back to the power company but later on as he grew, he decided to consume it, and sell any excess. The permits to do this cost him $750,0
00!!! He still persevered. I was really starting to like this guy, because he was not just saying all the right things he was actually DOING them! Just above the generator room was his glassblowing shop, where he had artisans making Christmas ornaments today. We were told he has shops selling his products in most major cities in this country, and a similar facility to the Queeche plant complete with river, and generator for power in PA. and a very large pottery shop in an old Bausch & Lomb plant in Md. He has to employ hundreds of people. This is one way to create employment in America
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