The Henry Ford

Ford broke ground for his museum in 1928. On that occasion, his good friend Thomas Edison was there and signed his name in the cornerstone concrete. Botanist Luther Burbank's garden spade was also shoved into the block, a fitting symbol, Ford thought, of the connections between agriculture and industry.

That block is one of the first things you'll see as you step into the museum, and it might get you thinking about those connections. If you'd like to ponder more, you can see the earliest traction engine, or the 1917 Fordson that did for tractors what the Model T did for automobiles, or the first self-propelled combine.

Maybe you want to think about how everyday life has changed because of manufacturing. You can trace the progressive development of stoves; compare kitchens from the 1790s, 1840s, 1890s and 1930s; and in "Your Place in Time," take a nostalgic journey through the pop culture icons and artifacts of the 20th century.

You can see how one man viewed the future of living at the Dymaxion house, a 1946 prototype of a modular "dwelling machine" that could be mass-produced at low cost. But this idea generated by R. Buckminster Fuller never caught on. You can't help but wonder what our cities would look like now if it had.

Transportation takes on new dimensions in exhibits such as "Heroes of the Sky," which traces the first 36 years of aviation history. You can see a full-scale replica of the Wright Brothers' Flyer or stand under a DC-3, which first demonstrated the possibilities of passenger air travel.

You can see how the transporting of people and goods changed from the early days of stagecoaches to the 125-foot-long Allegheny Locomotive, which, in 1941, could pull 160 coal cars over the hills of West Virginia.

Then there are the cars. You'd be hard-pressed to find a better demonstration of "The Automobile in American Life" than that offered by the nearly 100 vintage automobiles. There's everything from the first horseless carriages to sleek racing cars, from Ford's first Quadricycle to A.J. Foyt's Mark IV GT 40, from a 1927 Chrysler Imperial to a bright yellow 1955 Chevy Corvette Roadster.

And there are the presidential cars: the 1902 Brougham used by Teddy Roosevelt; the 1939 Lincoln that carried Franklin Roosevelt, the Bubble Top used by Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower and John Kennedy; the 1961 Lincoln that carried Kennedy on that fateful November day in Dallas.

Then you might wonder about all the things that grew up around the automobile as America took to the road. You can see gas stations, diners, Burma Shave jingles, motels, road signs, drive-in theaters and more.

You know that cars are often more than just cars, but this display reinforces that notion.