[time-nuts] Obscure HP T/F instruments in ebay.fr

[Robert LaJeunesse]

While it may not be time-nut centric there is a great museum in Michigan that has collections of both clocks and technology, along with a couple Stradavarius violins and machinist tools used by Mr. Daimler. The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, MI has been actively enlarging their technology collection - having recently paid nearly $1 million for an original Apple I built by Jobs & Wozniak. They also have Robert Moog's prototype music synthesizer. Might be time to interest them in adding precision time to their clock and technology collections.

Bob LaJeunesse

> Sent: Friday, March 20, 2015 at 1:33 AM
> From: "Bill Hawkins" <bill at iaxs.net>
> To: "'Tom Van Baak'" <tvb at leapsecond.com>, "'Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement'" <time-nuts at febo.com>
> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Obscure HP T/F instruments in ebay.fr
>
> There are worse things than breaking up a collection.
> 
> The Baaken Museum of Electricity in Life, near Minneapolis had a
> wonderful series of devices that used electricity to examine or prolong
> life, or to extract money from suckers. About 20 years ago, someone felt
> that there wasn't enough traffic at the museum, so the interesting
> exhibits were removed and the museum dumbed down for children. A vampire
> might greet you at the door.
> 
> It seems that modern business managers have no time for things that
> don't draw crowds or fly off the shelves. If a museum or business wants
> to serve a market niche, it must compete with the incessant blizzard of
> advertising from the companies that just have to grow. Combine that with
> such companies expectations of productivity, and no one has time to
> search for interesting museums, never mind go to national parks.
> 
> I would have been fascinated by and supportive of the French HP museum,
> had I known about it. I did not even dream such a place existed, but it
> makes sense that it was in Europe. Amsterdam has a science museum that
> lifts children's interest rather than going down to the lowest level to
> draw more people.
> 
> In regard to dumbing down, the movie "Idiocracy" seems predictive.
> 
> Bill Hawkins
> 
> P.S. The Pavek Museum of Broadcasting (radio) is still hanging on.