City preview · DETROIT

Detroit, from Model T's test room to the record press

At the Piquette factory, a team tested new parts on a Model N chassis as they developed the Model T. During Detroit's bankruptcy, the art museum digitized more than 180,000 records for court. A record shop has a window into its pressing plant. On Belle Isle, a retired freighter's pilothouse still faces a working shipping channel.

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Ford Piquette Avenue Plant Museum · Editorial illustration, not a historical photo

Car experiments, collection records and machines beside the river

A Model T test room, museum records, record presses and a pilothouse ashore

Four complete stories and their public sources are shown here; the rest of the collection is in the app.

01 · Ford Piquette Avenue Plant Museum

A secret room upstairs

Ford's mother's rocking chair shared the Model T workshop.

In 1907, Henry Ford had a secret experimental room partitioned off at a rear corner of Piquette's third floor. Drawings, machine tools and blackboards shared the space with his mother's old rocking chair. The team tried new parts on a Model N chassis, working toward the Model T. The museum has reconstructed the room from records. The moving assembly line came later, at Highland Park.

Source: detroithistorical.org Source: fordpiquetteplant.org Source: fordpiquetteplant.org Source: fordpiquetteplant.org

02 · Detroit Institute of Arts

180,000 records for the paintings

The bankruptcy dispute sent museum archives to court.

When Detroit's city government filed for bankruptcy in 2013, some creditors demanded the sale of the museum's collection. The museum digitized more than 180,000 records for use in court, showing that many important works had not been bought with city funds. The 2014 Grand Bargain linked two arrangements: the state, foundations and museum raised funds to support municipal pensions, while the collection and building passed to an independent nonprofit museum to preserve for the public.

Source: neh.gov Source: honigman.com Source: dia.org

03 · Third Man Records

Records pressed behind glass

The record shop has its own production window.

Third Man Records put its Detroit shop and pressing plant at the same address. On one side of the glass, machines press vinyl into records. On the other, customers flip through finished copies in sleeves. Official factory tours take visitors closer; the shop's viewing windows also offer a look at the equipment at work.

Source: thirdmanrecords.com Source: thirdmanpressing.com

04 · Dossin Great Lakes Museum

A pilothouse ashore

The ship retired. Its river view did not.

When the freighter William Clay Ford retired, its pilothouse was removed, preserved and installed in the Dossin Great Lakes Museum on Belle Isle. It faces the Detroit River. Stand beside the wheel and instruments and the windows still frame freighters moving along the shipping channel. This pilothouse, though, no longer travels with them.

Source: detroithistorical.org Source: detroithistorical.org

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