Meeting with gold star mothers today and tweeted and, this tweet from the republican who represents the 21st district of new york. ,poke at the Business Council new york state luncheon today about shared goals of increasing jobs and commerce in new yorks 21st district. Of congress back on tuesday, september 6. Coming upe things this fall, remaining federal spending bills for fiscal year 2016 2017. Zika prevention and research. Defense programs and policy, and possibly in the house, discussion of impeachment of the irs commissioner. For the next hour, and American History tv exclusive. The cities tour features visits port huron, michigan. For five years now, we have traveled to american cities, interviewing historians, authors, and leaders. You can watch more of our visit at cspan. Org citiestour. On the fourth floor of what is called the Municipal Office of city hall, right on the st. Clair river. Probably the most Eastern Point of michigan. Our population is around 30,000 people, which is a decrease. At one time, back many years ago probably in the 50s or 60s, it , would have been closer to the 40s. As economic changes and industry changes, it has decreased over the years. And demographically, we have an assortment of all different types of people, but i would the it a little bit on distressed side. Because we are this county seat, we have rentals and social services and things like that. We dont have the most stable population. It kind of comes and it goes. Economically probably not the , highest incomes, so it a Broad Spectrum of lower to upper income, but it is a Nice Community to live in and a nice place to raise your family. We ht things going on. The Unemployment Rate in michigan is higher than in the country and higher in this area. It has gone down. It has not gone down at the same we are always a little bit higher than the rest of the county and the rest of the state because michigan is traditionally, but we have had a lot of improvements over the last couple of years. Everyone suffered in 2008 when the economy tanked and we are crawling out of it, but it takes a little longer to crawl out of it, but we have some wonderful things happening, so im proud of that. We have an interest in our downtown area. A lot of downtowns have failed since everyone moved out to the malls and now i think the mall s are not doing so well. Our downtown is revitalized and we have a lot of new businesses and new restaurants and bars and quaint stores. Certainly no Big Department store or anything like that, but more loftting apartments. Something i would not have said years ago would go, but there has been a surge of those and we , have so many that they have waiting lists. That is good because in those lofts, its the professionals and that is what you are looking for to get some of the younger people to come back here and for jobs to come back here. It has seemed to be successful in that manner and we also have right behind where im standing on the river, a wonderful piece property, which used to house our ymca. It was sold to the city and this property was made development ready. Weve sold that to a developer and they are going to put highrise condos on that. I think they havent decided on the exact plan, but we are still in the stages of working on a site plan. But they should be started in a year at the latest. Its probably going to be at least four or five stories high, so this is going to bring a lot of people into town. That is we are looking for, kind of redeveloping and reinventing ourselves as a place to come not only if you are younger, getting people to live in the downtown area has been very much a part of that. I think one of the key parts of our history is we are celebrating, we have celebrated in our sesquicentennial and 2007, theres a lot of history. We are very proud of the lighthouse and the fact that people can visit and walk out to the top. Back in the day, you had shipping and logging and things like that. Obviously not today, but its a very strong part of our heritage. The bluewater bridge connects with ontario, and that was built in 1938. Before that, you have to take a ferry if you were going across. That is a cumbersome way to travel back and forth. The amount of commerce we get from canada to the United States is astronomical. A lot of it goes through port huron, but a lot of people come from canada to port huron to shop. It is a big part of the success of the businesses in this area, not just port huron but the surrounding area. Its important that they have this bridge. That lasted until the 90s. In 1997, they opened the second span of the bridge, and both sides going back and forth truck traffic is sometimes all the way across the bridge. Its very much doing its job and i think in the future, port huron is only going to get better. I do see a lot of interest from investors on the other side of the state, and thats one of the reasons that we ended up with the refurbishment of the Thomas Edison inn. Now a double and restaurant combined to there. That was an investor from the west side of the state. I think we are getting more notice from other places. A lot of times, people didnt know they knew where it was, but they thought it was a small little town by the bridge, one that you drive through. I think we are getting the reputation that it is definitely worth coming here. The people are friendly and we have nice places to go, so i think we will have a resurgence , even more than we have now, of our downtown and other businesses coming in and investments in the community, so im looking forward to good things happening. American history tv is at the museum. Dison depot its one of the many places we are visiting. We will hear about Thomas Edison and his ties to this city and that building. The 20th century would look so different without Thomas Edison and delightful, the photograph. The phonograph. These are ordinary, common things but they all came from his brain and his brain came from fort huron. He arrived here when he was seven years old and he was born in 1847. He started working here in 1859. The train station was built in 1858. He got the job as news butcher at age 12. Here, we have a vignette that shows edisons mother yelling at his teacher, mr. Crawford, who called edison addled. I guess today we might say stupid or confused or mixed up. You can see here that it hurt his feelings and angered her. She said, hes a lot smarter than you are and if you cant teach him, i will. So she took him home and home schooled him and he always credited his mother for making him the man he became through her kindness, through her teaching him, and a love of learning that he carried on his entire life. He Read Everything he could, in the evenings as a man, he would read the encyclopaedia britannica. I think if edison were in school today, he might have been on ritalin or some other medicine for add or adhd. I think he just had so much going on in his head that if he werent particularly interested in the subject matter at hand, he just didnt want to Pay Attention and wanted to explore things in his own way. We are on a restored train car from about 1889. This is used to represent the train car Thomas Edison rode daily as a 12yearold boy to detroit. It was a news butcher meaning a , news peddler, and he would have a basket and walk up and down the aisle of the train cars selling fruit, candy, cigars, newspapers. That was his job. He would arrive here at the at 7 00 a. M. And ride to detroit and come back at 8 00 or 9 00 at night. He would spend his time selling things to passengers. We have a recreation of his little Chemical Laboratory and printing equipment where he was , the first person we know of to print a newspaper on a moving train. He had access to the latest news through the telegraph agents at the train offices and would get that news hot off the presses. He also sold the detroit free press. During the civil war, he was doing this, right after the civil war battle of shiloh. He convinced the detroit free him 1000 copies of the paper on credit instead of buying them ahead of time. So he sold way more copies than he usually did. Ever the entrepreneur, he started raising the price and the closer he got back to port huron and the fewer papers he had back, the price went up. By the time he got back, it went from five cents a copy to . 25 a copy, and he sold them all out and was able to give his mother a nice chunk of change that day. This is his Chemical Laboratory in the basement which he originally had in the bedroom in the bathroom at home but , his mother objected to the potential hazards from mixing chemicals, so he moved to the basement and scrounged bottles all over town and would put them by chemicals and put them in these bottles that he labeled poison to keep people out. He labeled each bottle with a number and he kept a logbook, so he knew what was in each model in each bottle and could safely explore the properties of these chemicals. He had a chemistry book, and he was testing every statement made in the book to see if what it said in the book would really happen if he experimented. He had to see for himself if what the book said was true. We have some articles found in the archaeology of his boyhood home. The home burned in 1870, five years after his parents were evicted. It was left there until it was excavated in the 1980s. Theres no way to know if all of these things came from edison but we do have printers type , that matches the type used first on the train until he was kicked off the train after some of his chemicals from the laboratory copy train car on fire. He moved the laboratory to the basement again. His father went to the railroad and asked, if he stops this nonsense, can he have his job back . This is edison at the age she the age he was working here. A glint in his eye very likable. I think thats how he talked people into letting him do things like have a Chemical Laboratory on the train, or actually run this train, for example. It takes a great deal of knowledge and skill to run a steam engine like that. He talked to the he talked to the engineer and the firemen into letting him do it. They knew what it took and apparently had the confidence he could do it. They were wrong in his assessment of his abilities. While they were taking a nap, he was running the train, and they were rudely awakened with a scalding hot splash of dirty, oily water. He really didnt know what he was doing, and that was the end of his dream to be an engineer, but thank goodness for that because he went on to such great things. This is a telegraph office. Trains had telegraph operators because trains are dispatched by had aaph, so each station telegraph operator. Edison had an interest in anything electrical, especially telegraphs. When he was a boy, it was a relatively new technology. He was four years old when it was invented. At 12, it was still relatively new. He really wanted to learn it badly. He made his own connected between his own house and a couple of neighbors. He was not proficient and his equipment was cobbled from junk. It was in michigan on his way to , detroit, he was acting as a news butcher and he saw the threeyearold son of the station master playing on the track. A boxcar was rolling toward him. Nobody set the break or something. He ran and saved the kid just in time and ingratitude, mr. Mackenzie thought tom, or al as he went by as a use, taught him mores code properly. In two months, he had become proficient enough to get his first job as an operator in downtown port huron. It was more of a general store. They sold everything. He lasted there six months. He was not a good employee. He tinkered with all the equipment, he broke the tools. After about six months, they parted ways. Mr. Walker always had nice things to say. He went to stratford junction , ontario and got a job as , telegraph agent. He ended up moving all over the midwest. He never stayed anywhere very long. He was always getting in trouble on the job for tinkering with the equipment. At one point, he let a bottle of acid run through the floor and into the bosses desk below. He was fired for that. For a few years, he had three different jobs in three different cities in different places around the midwest. We know he did not last long as an employee and it was important for him to be the boss. That is one of the lessons he learned. It had to be his way or its just not going to work out for him. Mary had a little lamb, his fleece was white as snow. Everywhere that mary went the lamb was sure to go. We have a model of the first , invented this was a 1877. Popular project for people learning machine work. The Edison Laboratory had blueprints made so people could make a copy if they wanted to. We have one here. This was recorded on tinfoil and you would wrap tinfoil around the cylinder nice and smooth. You would speak into one of boss one win in would emboss the tinfoil and the diaphragm of your voice would make a go up and down, and then you would play it back on the other one. This is the only one that used a different recording head and you realize after that that the same would work to record and playback. This is a 50,000 watt lightbulb that was supposed to be a perpetual memorial to edison. It was lit in 1940 by edisons widow, who came to town for the World Premiere of young tom edison. Mickey rooney played Thomas Edison. Here at the museum, we have a newsreel from the time. Of Mickey Rooney arriving from the time period of Mickey Rooney arriving on the old train and mrs. Edison throws the switch. I think you need welding gobbles to look at it. It is so bright, even on the camera. Edisons most famous for the lightbulb, but his favorite invention, he said was the phonograph. He figured out a way to save sound. I can play this if you like. This is a model from 1905. From 1915. R is i brought this in for memorial day. He invented the cylinder format. Some of your people might not realize that records were shaped like this originally. This one is celluloid. Its called indestructiblesome e ause the early blacks once the early wax ones were very fragile. This one, i could drop and it would suffer no ill effects. The heyday of the cylinder machine was roughly 1895 to 1915 or so. In the 20s, they did make cylinder machines. He actually produced cylinders until about 1929. He was always very loyal to his customers, providing them with cylinders as late until 1929. One of his most famous quotes is genius is 1 inspiration and 99 perspiration. He knew everything was hard work and he was not afraid to do that hard work and he showed that in the laboratory that he built in the basement of his home where , he was testing every statement made in a book about chemistry to see for himself if it was true or not, and it became important to have that work ethic. That showed when he was working on the lightbulb. Differentrough 1000 compositions for the filament until he finally found the right one. Hard work and sticking to it served him well in life. Port huron is proud of Thomas Edison. Hes probably one of the most famous people in the world. He spent his formative years here and we still have this beautiful train depot that he worked out of. The Jewelry Store is still there. His parents and family are still in the cemetery. It just shows us that people from a small town can go on to do great things. Edison invented the century. Cspan is visiting port huron to learn more about the citys history. Graphic op is for it will talk about the First White House in the state of michigan. In the state of michigan, there are over 116 lighthouses and this ones claim to fame is being the first. We just came up from the 99 steps to the top of the fort ot white house. We have the blue water bridge is to the south and lake huron to the east. We are at the st. Clair river at the mouth of the lake. You can see the nice bluewater and what tourists come to this area for. When they hear this is the blue water area, this is what they get to see, and they realize they are not lying. Just north to the city, in the city limits of port huron, it gets its namesake from the military port established here in 1814. Charles gratiot what the gentleman who built fort gratiot. He was an engineer in the army and was responsible for building fort gratiot. In response to an attack that could come from canada and protecting the mouth of the river. The decision to add the lighthouse was made around the 1820s. At that time, traffic was increasing on the great lakes, so they felt this was a significant spot. It will become michigans first. In 1825, congress appropriated money to build lighthouse just south of where we are standing, by the bluewater bridges. It was right at the mouth of the river. It was built by Winslow Lewis and the construction of the building was subpar, and it led to deterioration and soon after, it would collapse with a november storm. When the original tower collapsed, the need for a new tower was evident. A new location. The tower was moved several hundred yards to the north on lake huron and congress appropriated about 5,000 to build the tower in 1828. Construction began, and by december of 1829 the new tower , was completed and lantern was lit in december. The lighthouse laid a very significant role because you had mariners going up and down the st. Clair river. It was a narrow channel that was known at that time as rapid. The water was quick moving and swift. Guiding the mariners towards that channel in making sure they were in line with that area was very important. The light provided safe harbor for mariners who sailed in port huron on for mariners on lake huron, which could prove to be treacherous, especially in october or november. Its a very important lighthouse for those reasons. The fort is operational from time to time. It is a military installation, so as the needs came to be, the fort would be regarrison and used. Theas regarrison when cholera epidemic affected the surrounding area. It was regarrisoned during the civil war. The 27th michigan infantry would be mustered into service and learn their tactics and training at fort gratiot, and then would go on to kentucky and other points south. After the civil war, you will see dramatic changes at the Fort Gratiot Light station. There is an increase in traffic for westward expansion, so the site here is going to grow. The Lighthouse Services also realizing that a lot of their lighthouses are out of date and be an upgrade. This would see a dramatic change during the civil war. Construction begin on the tower to extend it from 65 feet to 82 feet. This was kind of standard at the time. You see these towers and certainly become taller and they have a greater range. The site would see a significant change in 1871, the addition of a fog signal building. It was actually smoke. In 1871, a great fire raged across michigan in the smoke bellowed out and created a difficult situation for mariners to navigate. So, they added the fog signal building that sat on the north end of our property, and 10 years later, another fire came through the state and a second fog signal was added. At that time, that fog signals purpose was guiding mariners through the river. When the lighthouse was built in 1829, the contract approved the building of the tower and a single keepers dwelling and the outhouse. In 1873, it was determined it was no longer suitable and they would Start Construction of a new dwelling, which was the keepers duplex. In 1874, that was completed and the fog signal buildings would run their course and be out dated by the turnofthecentury. In 1900, a new brick fog signal building would be added. You wouldnt see many changes until the 1930s. At that time, a new dwelling was built, so you had not only the duplex, but another building. At the same time that the single keepers dwelling was built the , coast guard, who was in operation at that time, would build a new coast guard station. It was built 60 feet from the single keepers swelling, and although they were on the same property they were run by two , separate government agencies. In 1938, they ran a four bay equipment building and the site would stay unchanged until world war ii. At that time, the site becomes a training location for the coast guard during the war. Landscape around the light station would also change. In peacetime, the site had gardens and an orchard. They were hedges that were actually shaped like freighters. During wartime, all of that goes away. In 2010, the site was transferred to st. Clair county. We began restoration of the site, which began with a tower. We started looking at the other buildings and their needs for restoration. We started looking at getting grants for the site. Its a 25 year plan to restore the site and bring it back to its 1930s appearance. Most of the buildings that were here were established by the 1930s, so it was a natural fit we have one period building in the keepers duplex restored to the 1930s appearance and what it does is allows visitors to get a glimpse of what the building would look like when it is restored. This is a unique part of michigans history. We get a lot of visitors that love lighthouses and come from all over the United States and canada. We are right next to an international crossing. I think what we are trying to do here is show that we can become a destination for tourism. There is a lot of unique sites around the area including the light station in that it provides a venue for people to catch a glimpse into the local areas past. The bluewater bridge is a nice little river between the city of port huron that separates the two countries, two. Ifferent cities i have been fortunate to watch this structure go and become one of the most important infrastructures in north america. The traffic that uses the bridge initially, a large part of it is recreational travel. A lot of people use this as a gateway. It is 160 miles to toronto from here. If we had to go down south of the great lakes, it would take us twice as long. It is that much of a difference. Kid, i used to go across it on my bike all the time. As an adult, i would go over there and do dinner and visit friends over there. The u. S. Dollar was really strong back in the day, so we used to go over there and get gas. Now things have changed quite a bit. Port huron is an interesting destination crossroads. In the early days, we had for trappers. Their goods came through here. Lumber was a big part of our area commerce. Trees were felled and floated down to markets further south of here. And, with the railroad, that increased our agricultural trade because farmers could get their produce to market. Trains were a very important part of this area and its development. 1859, the Canada Railroad built a train depot on this site and wanted to connect to markets west of here. The trains that would come to this area would stop at Point Edwards and uncouple all of these cars, put them on a car ferry. This area is actually known as the rapids. Imagine very fast currents and this car ferry with all these heavy cars. It took a long time to get these trains across and onto chicago, but the market was that important that they did that. The Railroad Traffic started increasing incredibly, to the point where they built a tunnel under the st. Clair river that connected both canada and america in 1891. It is still in operation today, though it is now a second tunnel. Bridge construction started in this was after detroit opened 1927, its international bridge. The construction of the bluewater bridge started in 1937 and was completed in 1938. The original span is furthest from us. The first unit that the bridge was opened, 61,000 cars crossed it. They established a regular bussing system so people could continue to shop. We were always friends and neighbors. The bridge was the first door, is just another doorway that was open. I came to the bridge in 1972 as a summer job as a toll collector and ended up staying 38 years. I was able to come in as a toll collector it was a pretty small operation, a quiet border crossing. As traffic started to grow and then there was a completion of interstate 69 between lansing and port huron, and the 402 once , that was completed, that provided a straight shot from the east to the west, a great commercial route for the Trucking Companies because they could come across this structure, come from new york go , into canada, come to canada , and come right to the bluewater bridge and continue on out west with very little interference. The need for the second span became obvious as they tracked all the traffic that came across each year. 47 of the traffic was passenger, but each year we can see the increase in truck traffic. About every 10 years, truck traffic doubled. They knew they had to do something, so they started doing research on building a second span. They wanted to look similar, so they presented different plans so that it was still a beautiful bridge to look at. I think we opened it in 1997. Once we opened that in we closed 1997, the original one down and rebuilt it. In 1999, we had two structures. By having two structures, it made the flow greater for the commercial aspect. Were the second busiest commercial crossing in north america. To have three lanes of traffic each direction allowed us to separate the traffic and give us a much smoother flow. The best thing about this crossing is that we have two structures, we have redundancies, so we have more lane capacity than other crossings in canada and the United States. Reasons,vious september 11 did a lot to put a damper on the traffic in this area. That day, everything came to a screeching halt. Traffic didnt move for commercial traffic was backed up hours. For days because they did not know what was going on. They didnt know what kind of threats that would be to the structure and whatnot, so everything came to a halt. After that, our life at the bluewater bridge changed. Wait times increased as security became tighter. Before, in my days growing up here, you could get across the bridge with your birth certificate and a quarter. In 2009, it was required you had a passport and its not as easy to go across now. Traffic does not flow as quickly as it used to back in the day. By the traffic increasing, you tend to see longer lines than before. Before, you never thought about it. If you wanted to go to canada and have lunch, you would go to canada and have lunch and be back in an hour and half. Now you have to think its a , process now. You have to allow time for customs to do their job and keep our country safe. At any highway, there is always maintenance that needs to be done. It is an eyesore, but it is necessary. The current project has been going on less than a year. The bridge has become a symbol. It is on our First Responders patches and is instantly it is on our First Responders patches and is instantly recognizable. A lot of people take this for granted. It is so amazing to wake up in one city and and up in a different country in a matter of minutes. I have traveled a lot, but there is nothing like this location. It is beautiful, it is friendly, and it is very accessible. Welcome to port huron. Wltons icets kno museum of north America Owner , Chuck Knowlton will take us inside and show us around his collection of ice industry memorabilia, one of the largest in the country. The ice industry actually is an industry gone by. Everybody knows what packaged ice is today, but the real ice industry was 100, 200 years ago, when they used to cut ice out of the rivers and lakes for all kinds of uses, and it became an extremely large industry because everybody needed ice to cool their food for their family. It became one of the 10, possibly one of the five Largest Industries in the United States at that time and it continued on for 100 years at least and got into the mid1900s, and after world war ii, it died off because of mechanical refrigeration and home refrigerators that really took over. In the early years, ice was a new thing to people, that it could cool foods and keep them fresh. As it came on the scene, of course in the older days, they maintain mayt to to maintain Meat Products and such. But as the ice came on the scene, they found it would work better, and it became a big deal to use ice to haul all kinds of food. Meets and fruits, across the country on rail lines. To start using ice was a novelty stuff and the , wealthy did start using it. In the white house, on the political scene, they got the best ice in early years for a in early years, where a lot of the runofthemill people did not have it in early years. They found ways to chip ice and make it into little cubes and have ice for drinks. Here is probably the most wellknown part of the industry, ice picks. Here are several examples of different ice picks. Here are metal ice picks in the usually pick right here. Ice picks and the usual picks right here. A lot of them had advertisements on it. This one is cocacola advertising on this ice pick. Others had the name of the ice company on it. Down here are more different types of ice picks. Here is one with a bottle opener. Here are ice picks over along with ice scrapers. They would scrape the top of the block and get crushed ice for their drink. Another staple was ice tongs. Almost every house had ice tongs because they would need to carry , maybe if theys made a delivery and they would have to of the iceman made a delivery and they would have to take the ice themselves and put it in the ice box. It developed along with many other areas in the northern states. The northern states had a cold climate and a lot of them were ice on thee thick rivers and lakes, so in port huron as well as other cities and towns around the northern states, they started to cut the ice around rivers and lakes. It developed as the industry was developing throughout the whole country in port huron, they , would cut it out of the black river and lake huron in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Just in our area, in the port huron area, for many years, there were over Ice Companies in 30 our area. These Ice Companies would thrive and be very competitive against each other. Some of the companies would be smaller, maybe just a part time guy dragging ice out of the river behind his home. Some companies were very large and become Industrial Companies which would have many employees , and also was a very hard industry and cold. The employees would have to be big guys and tough to stand the elements. Some of the dangers were that the horses that pulled the plows cut the ice and could actually fall through into the water. Not only the horses, but the men. This was very dangerous and on occasion, people would drown. Also when they were storing the , ice in big Storage Facilities, they would cut it into a 300 pound block and go into the storage and at times, people , were killed. Read that when someone was ed in a nice company would be pulled by a horse. The operator would stand back here and he will guide the club. Out therewould be pulling the plow. The plow would not cut all the way through the ice. That would end on how far they far down in the ice. On occasion as there pulling it the horseoo far down could solve the ice. Sometimes the horse would thought into the ice and i read where they would feed the horse old males so the horse would throw better than they would get the horse out of the lake or river. Was from the mid1800s to the early 1900s. Every home needed ice to keep their mood who called. Flowed cold. It would also be the people that would take care of the Storage Facilities and then the distribution would be horse and every home had an ice box. This was a very laborintensive industry, employed an awful lot of people. Your changein things because you could keep food much longer. Milk would be a good example part before they would milk the cow and use the milk. Now with ice in their icebox they could quickly milk in the icebox ice box and keep it for a day or two days or more. This icebox here is a good example of a very quality possibly expensive icebox of the day. It is a large ice box, is larger than the others around here and very well made. Its a beautiful icebox. This is an area where they were put the ice. This area right here would either hold 50 pounds of ice. Wouldof the ice boxes hold 25 pounds. But this will hold quite a bit of ice. Herece is up at the top because the cold air goes down. It would flow this way and go down to the lower area where youd keep the food. Is an example of the inside of ice boxes. They were quality and clean at the time. Several items in our museum that this is the oldest one. It was used for ice delivery and deliver to help out the houses. The dime driver would take the blocks of ice into her home and put it in the icebox. This is the scale when he would win the ice with the ice. He would put the ice on the scale and see how much it weighed before he took it in. This is an ice card and the housewife would put whichever number amount of ice she would like to have. In this case, she would tell him she wanted 25 pounds of ice. If it was this way she would tell the driver she wants 50 pounds of ice. That way the driver would not have to make two trips into the house. The natural ice industry has always been very interesting. Ice was ice that was cut out of the rivers and lakes. They started to produce ice with mechanical refrigeration, they call it artificial ice. Ice, whether it is frozen by nature or it is frozen by men. But not in their eyes. The natural ice suppliers really coming onslaught of companies that were going to make on his with mechanical refrigeration. Some of the advertisements that , that seen in our museum my father collected really show the natural ice industry try to ward off the mechanical eyes industry coming on the scene. It was interesting. They really thought it out. Mechanical refrigeration one it out. Duration efers refrigeration went into home ice boxes and it would be used in gigantic ice plants that would make big blocks of ice and they would pump it out by the hundreds of times a day. Mechanical refrigeration really 1900sd in the very early and came on the scene probably in the 1920s and 30s. By the time we got to world war ii, home refrigerators were on the incline. After world war ii they took over. The 1950s, the ice industry delivering ice to homes was almost dead. It still continued a little bit for people out in the country and in cottages, people that use ice in the outlying areas. The reason for the museum being the public oncate an interest on an industry gone by. So many kids today have no idea how life was 100 or 200 years ago. Life was tough. It was very tough. They didnt have the conveniences that they have today. If you come into the museum, they will see how tough the ice industry was back then and how tough keeping food was. They just couldnt go to the refrigerator and get all the things that they cant today. Ice was the pioneer in making that happen. Starting of people having the foods they want when they want them. Lakeport state park here in port huron, michigan. It is a state park. Back in june of 19 52 this was owned by the end Union Members would come up here and spend the summers with her family. Time was theone site of the Founding Convention for the students of a democrat society. They came in here to write what has become known as the poor here on statement. The students for a Democratic Society were a group formed in ann arbor, michigan by al haber, tom hayden and a few others. They wanted to bring about a more Democratic Society. They figure that they needed a manifesto to bring that about. Write theirre to manifesto. Group. A student they wanted to sort of build a more Democratic Society. They looked at the problems of the u. S. And they said these come about because of a lack of democracy. In order to fix them we need more. Here, workingther from an original draft by tom hayden. They broke it up into pieces, gave it to about groups of five to 10 people and they worked on their sections. Of whaten wrote a draft became the port huron statement, brought it here and divided it up in each group worked on a particular section. Then they came together and voted on the final pace. It went forward. , why theygether thought it was important, they looked around america and they saw the problem of racism and poverty and political apathy. They thought that the best way was to getthat students involved. They thought specifically College Students should be change agents. Because universities are distributed across the country and colleges would have intellectual ties to work on social problems and bring about a more Democratic Society. The influence between the time. Of 1962 into the 1970s was quite big. Statement was a catalyst for the 1960 student movement. It got the ball rolling in the felt that College Students that they belong and that they mattered and they could make a change in society. It wasnt just the port huron statement, it was a lot of the work that they did afterwards. There were 10 people, two they werent send people to College Campuses to recruit members. They grew until a contentious split in 1969. It was quite a big movement that ,as just done through hard work mail campaigns and people talking to other people. A newanted to introduce left. A new left broke with communism. They didnt have a thought out system. Participatory for democracy. They thought that if you make democracy available to everybody and that everybody has a say in the decisions that affect their lives you could bring about a better society. What that society will look like, we dont know. They did not give us what that end goal is. We think that all human beings have undeveloped capacities for freedom and love. Society to to set up foster those capacities. What is important in the port huron statement, it is interesting to look at the first sentence. We are people of this generation house now and universities living looking uncomfortably to the world we inherit. In that particular sentence, they are saying we are we areity students, but worried about the future. Lets look at the world that we are about to inherit. If you look at the majority of the statement, it doesnt give this complete political philosophy. It looks at the problems but they are about to get. The cold war, and political apathy amongst the people. Not to mention widespread poverty. Problemsght that these came about the has of a lack of are fixing ithey with more democracy and not less. There were about 60 students that could get closer to that, 60 students, and they came here because it had the infrastructure. Right now, theres just this wonderful, lovely part. At the time there were a bunch of different cabins and a large kitchen area so that they could cook and sleep and hold all the people that were here. Work on again was to this. Aff they used a participatory to try andethod write the document. Here for the 50th anniversary of the port huron statement in 2012. Tom just doesnt follow down. Amazing that he is in his early 70s and he just gives moving and he keeps writing. It is incredible. Here, herought him bolted out of the car and went right to the water and was standing there looking out over the water. I have to admit it seemed like he was home. I think the port huron statement has a long, slow influence. It wasnt right out of the gate influence but today there is many people, many activists who working you are working on things like participatory budgeting. Places like new york and San Francisco have money set aside for local areas and on the people get together and decide how that money will be spent. Back tohat is traceable the port huron statement. They tried to build the student movement, they tried to build a democracy movement. Then it fractured in 1968 and 1969, when a group of members went to a more revolutionary rest and is thousand violence. Tom and alex haber want to to be more of a reformist and it fractured and it was all over. Up, there were almost one million members. College students around the country campuses everywhere at chapters. The to thentered peace movement, the antiwar movement. It was hard to break them apart. How the port huron statement is represented today is one of two ways, or maybe two of two ways. Thats this idea that i say it is very noble document looking for participatory democracy, wanting to be more inclusive and bring people democracynd have more , not less. There is another group of people that say it is a radical hippies a bunch ofhey are degenerates that wrote it and that sort of thing. Read it and decide for yourself. What i would like people to understand about thatort huron statement is we havent achieved our country yet. We are not there. We need to do more. Each one of us and that democracy can open up the society for us. Is one way tolife bring us together. That we can talk to each other, we can Work Together to solve shared problems. And make this a more just and Democratic Society. Statement in has a harkening sentence. If that is we see the attainable let it be known that to do so to avoid the unimaginable. I think the unimaginable that they had there was the cold war and nuclear war. A lack of democracy and a continuation of the rampant racism in america at the time. That scared them, and that moved them to organize and get people to join. Are waiting for entry. Rehab radio and gps. We have radio and the gps. Horn]ring this ship was built in 1942. Best moneybably the the government spent because this ship is ideally designed for what it was supposed to do what it did that job and it is because they are not blowing smoke, because we had all these people that were qualified and wanted to be here and took care of this vessel or they were very the shipit or it itself is 180 feet long and it. As one of 39 that were built they were built in a rush and world war ii. Wide. Ip is 37 feet it weighs when it was fully dressed approximately 1100 tons. It draws 13 feet of water, and it is built to crush ice and also deploy buoys. It is an icebreaker when you need it. To 1944. El goes back the coast guard bought a bunch of these. When world war ii came around they started building them like crazy. Understandant to what this particular ship did. It made the Northwest Passage and it served the government for 71 years. Extremef the very deployments that visit made was at the end of world war ii it was in san diego and honolulu. 1936, end of the war in the government wanted to 1946, this ship isamble said buoys that buoys. In 1946 it participate in and its function was to put the german, japanese submarines, the american ships in position for. He task an on the bombs were blown off in two different locations. One was 500 feet above the water and so it was an aerial task. Then they look at the effect it had radiation why and damage on ships that were the in the larisa. There were 192 ships that were in that class. The bramble was a very busy ship and it did a lot of. A lot of work. The second externally think that the bramble did is to other left and they circumnavigated they went through the north wall they broke ice, they set buoys and set commercial routes so that we could get east coast west coast and west coast east coast instead of going through the panama canal they could go through the north pole. They had to deal with 20 feet of ice. They had to deal with very cold temperatures. Of the three ships that made the passage, it is called the Northwest Passage. The bramble is the last of those three ships. Go to write 20. For safee responsible operations and navigation and we and worked all of the buoys worked on some light houses from alpena, michigan, all the way down to toledo, ohio. We were responsible. Task withso icebreaking. We broke from ice from helping to the river rouge client plant. Worklowed the commerce to as long as it could without restraints. All of the commerce echoes on in the great legs depended on navigating in those waters, and in the summertime, too. Its a demanding job. The bad thing on the crew is as the ships braking ice is very noisy. You can imagine, you have the crew down below and they are not getting rest or good sleep. You get to a point you are no longer effective. I will hold the ice until daylight. We will start breaking ice again then. Here we are in the crew berthing. Asked aft aft. They had up to 57 crew members, at that point you had three in the rack. You did not want to set up too fast if you were in these racks. On we wanted more comfort in these 1970s and 1980s, the three stack which is very tight we only have two in a stack. With two you have room below. As if you set up or wanted to get up you have the headroom to not get a head not your. Knocker. I was taken aback. We havent had crew member that serve on the bramble on the dock. , in charge a medic of keeping everybody healthy and alive. Got blown away robert said we will pick this up the way it was fix it up the way it was when i was a onboard ship. It is a level four trauma center. He has everything that will keep you alive for at least two hours until you can get transport and gone to a level two or a level one center. One of the things that makes iss ship so durable is it round and very curvy and it has a same as seal stainless steel propeller. We are in the main engine room of the bramble. What we are looking at is we are looking at two main engines. Big, electric motor vehicles, engines that are going to be on trains. They drive an electric generator and they parallel together and they go into this power board here. This technology is technology that will be the most reliable. That is because we are breaking ice. When you break ice, you are going to be looking at shock waves like that. Getting eyes. What happens is if you look at these engines directly with the iseller, what we have here an engine driving a generator, and the generate generate generator drives electric motor. Technology is about as good as youre going to get. Reliabilityg to get galore and as minimal amount of smages you can to the ship proposal system. You have all these electric motors and generators that are like sharp shock absorbers. Powerre putting a lot of out there to push through the let the bow drop. Entering the officer ntry which is the asked aft end of the ship. This is where they have their morning at a meeting. One of thee have most proud pieces of the ship, what we consider the heart and soul of the ship, the ships bow. It is the original bell, it was originally on the part of the hound it was out in front. To marry back the soul of the ship, even though we are not any longer in service, we are a ship that is not registered and is not property of the u. S. Government. We want to marry that u. S. Government now which they keep forever, mary it back to the ship. The curator was very gracious to get us a contract so that we could keep the ships bell and keep all those crew members retired and present current with the heart of the ship. Its good for people to come and see this place and understand how they live, work and what they did here are in that should not be lost. This is coast guard history of this country. That is why the museum is important. It is a time capsule. It is American History. It started under a war had itsent, and it makings to do a big job and to continue that job as part of history. Its a lesson. Our hope is that to get it to the point where we can