Vintage everything

Following five weeks straight of working without a day off, my family and I hopped a plane to the midwest to visit family and hubby's alma mater.  While there, hubby dragged us to what I was sure, would be the second most boring three hours of my life visiting the Sindelar Tool Museum in Edwardsburg, Michigan.  (The second after the 10 hours we spent at Musee de l'Armee in Paris while on our honeymoon.  Ok it wasn't really 10 hours, it just felt like it.)

I was pleasantly surprised by the Sindelar Tool Museum.  Hubby wanted to go because he collects hand tools for woodworking.  Apparently, this is a world famous tool museum.  You wouldn't know it from the outside.  It seemed to be just another industrial building, next to the train tracks, in a tiny town, literally so small, you would miss it if you blinked while driving through.  I expected to see  maybe a hundred or so tools but not much else. Instead, disguised in the boring looking industrial building, is literally one of the world's most important collections of hand tools.  There were tools dating from the Stone Age to around the 1930s or 40's.  Some of the tools are antiques dating back to ancient Egypt and are the only one of their kind anywhere on earth.  Mingled in with the tools are all sorts of fascinating other items like these shoes which were from somewhere in Northern Europe and were used to husk chestnuts.

He seems to just collect whatever catches his eye which could be an old radio control boat made by the chief carpenter for the Queen Mary, or this pair of clogs. I didn't get a chance to ask what these shoes were used for.  I just loved that they reminded me of Japanese Geta sandals but have a cool shape on the upper shoe too.








Antique Stirrups:








A small collection of irons


Vintage hats


Finally, I was very interested in this armour from a Mongolian tribe made of some type of leather.  the little scales on the bottom were individually laced together before being attached to the

I think if you're going to drive from New York to LA or vice versa, this is one of those places you should go out of your way to see if you have any interest in the history of tools.  It becomes overwhelming after a while when you start to realize how important everything is and how old some of it is.  The owner travels the world collecting all sorts of stuff.  Some of it goes into the museum and some is sold to fund future purchases.  It made me want to start collecting antique sewing implements.  So far, I have two pairs of ginormous shears used to cut heavyweight fabric for military uniforms.