Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
point stove just like the one my mom used to have, a soda pop dispenser like the one that
used to stand in front of the pool hall in Winfield.
There was even a collection of milk bottles exactly like those that Mr. Morrisey, the
deaf milkman, used to bring to our house every morning. Mr. Morrisey was the noisiest
milkman in America. He was about sixty years old and wore a large hearing aid. He
always traveled with his faithful dog, Skipper. They would arrive like clockwork just be-
fore dawn. Milk had to be delivered early, you see, because in the Midwest it spoiled
quickly once the sun came up. You always knew when it was 5:3o because Mr. Morrisey
would arrive, whistling for all he was worth, waking all the dogs for blocks around, which
would get Skipper very excited and set him to barking. Being deaf, Mr. Morrisey ten-
ded not to notice his own voice and you could hear him clinking around on your back
porch with his rack of milk bottles and saying to Skipper, “WELL, I WONDER WHAT
THE BRYSONS WANT TODAY! LET'S SEE ... FOUR QUARTS OF SKIMMED AND
SOMECOTTAGECHEESE.WELL,SKIPPER,WOULDYOUFUCKINGBELIEVEIT,
I LEFT THE COTTAGE CHEESE ON THE GODDAMN TRUCK!” And then you would
look out the window to see Skipper urinating on your bicycle and lights coming on in
houses all over the neighborhood. Nobody wanted to get Mr. Morrisey fired, on account
ofhisunfortunate disability,butwhenFlynnDairies discontinued homedeliveries inabout
1960 on economic grounds ours was one of the few neighborhoods in the city from which
there was no outcry.
I walked through the museum in a state of sudden, deep admiration for Henry Ford and
his acquisitive instincts. He may have been a bully and an anti-Semite, but he sure could
build a nifty museum. I could happily have spent hours picking around among the memor-
abilia. But the hangar is only a fractional part of it. Outside there is a whole village-a little
town-containing eighty homes of famous Americans. These are the actual homes, not rep-
licas. Ford crisscrossed the country acquiring the residences and workshops of the people
he most admired-Thomas Edison, Harvey Firestone, Luther Burbank, the Wright brothers
and of course himself. All these he crated up and shipped back to Dearborn where he used
them to build this 250-acre fantasyland-the quintessential American small town, a pictur-
esque and timeless community where every structure houses a man of genius (almost in-
variablyawhite,ChristianmanofgeniusfromtheMiddleWest).Hereinthisperfectplace,
with its broad greens and pleasing shops and churches, the lucky resident could call on Or-
ville andWilburWrightforabicycle innertube,gototheFirestone farmformilkandeggs
(but not for rubber yet-Harvey's still working on it!), borrow a book from Noah Webster
and call on Abraham Lincoln for legal advice, always assuming he's not too busy with pat-
ent applications for Charles Steinmetz or emancipating George Washington Carver, who
lives in a tiny cabin just across the street.
