Ford Motor Company Brooklyn Plant | |
Location | 221 Mill St., Brooklyn, Michigan |
---|---|
Coordinates | 42°06′35″N84°14′33″W / 42.10972°N 84.24250°W |
Area | less than one acre |
Built | 1938 |
Architectural style | Moderne |
NRHP reference No. | 100000532 [1] |
Added to NRHP | January 12, 2017 |
The Ford Motor Company Brooklyn Plant is a former industrial plant once owned by the Ford Motor Company, located at 221 Mill Street in Brooklyn, Michigan. The plant was one of Ford's village industries, which were small factories located in rural areas in southern Michigan. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2017. [1]
In 1832, Calvin Swain purchased the land at this location along the River Raisin. Some time after that, he established a gristmill at the site. [2] The Brooklyn mill burned down in about 1912. [3] Henry Ford purchased the property in 1921, but did not use it for some time. [2] In 1938, [4] he constructed a new building constructed on the site, and the plant opened in 1939. [5] It employed up to 130 people making workers horn buttons and starter switches. [2] During World War II, production shifted to brass spark plug bushings for B-24 bombers. [2] After the war, the line returned to making horn buttons and starter switches until 1954, when production shifted to armrests and lamp lenses. [5]
The Brooklyn site closed in 1967. [5] After it was closed, the building was owned by Industrial Automotive Products, a subsidiary of Jackson Gear. [5] The building has been recently used to house a collector's Model T collection, [5] then housed an alternative fuel research company. [4] The building was purchased by Daniel and Samantha Ross in 2014 and is being converted into an Irish themed destination called the Old Irish Mill. [6] However, funding fell through in 2018. [7]
The Brooklyn plant is a Moderne style red brick plant with large windows. [8]
Albert Kahn was an American industrial architect who designed industrial plant complexes such as the Ford River Rouge automobile complex. He designed the construction of Detroit skyscrapers and office buildings as well as mansions in the city suburbs. He led an organization of hundreds of architect associates and in 1937, designed 19% of all architect-designed industrial factories in the United States. Under a unique contract in 1929, Kahn established a design and training office in Moscow, sending twenty-five staff there to train Soviet architects and engineers, and to design hundreds of industrial buildings under their first five-year plan. They trained more than 4,000 architects and engineers using Kahn's concepts. In 1943, the Franklin Institute posthumously awarded Kahn the Frank P. Brown Medal.
The Highland Park Ford Plant is a former Ford Motor Company factory located at 91 Manchester Street in Highland Park, Michigan. It was the second American production facility for the Model T automobile and the first factory in history to assemble cars on a moving assembly line. It became a National Historic Landmark in 1978.
The Henry Ford is a history museum complex in Dearborn, Michigan, United States, within Metro Detroit. The museum collection contains the presidential limousine of John F. Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln's chair from Ford's Theatre, Thomas Edison's laboratory, the Wright Brothers' bicycle shop, the Rosa Parks bus, and many other historical exhibits. It is the largest indoor–outdoor museum complex in the United States and is visited by over 1.7 million people each year. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1969 as Greenfield Village and Henry Ford Museum and designated a National Historic Landmark in 1981 as "Edison Institute".
Willow Run, also known as Air Force Plant 31, was a manufacturing complex in Michigan, United States, located between Ypsilanti Township and Belleville, built by the Ford Motor Company to manufacture aircraft, especially the Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber. Construction of the Willow Run Bomber Plant began in 1940 and was completed in 1942.
The Ford Piquette Avenue Plant is a former factory located within the Milwaukee Junction area of Detroit, Michigan, in the United States. Built in 1904, it was the second center of automobile production for the Ford Motor Company, after the Ford Mack Avenue Plant. At the Piquette Avenue Plant, the company created and first produced the Ford Model T, the car credited with initiating the mass use of automobiles in the United States. Prior to the Model T, several other car models were assembled at the factory. Early experiments using a moving assembly line to make cars were also conducted there. It was also the first factory where more than 100 cars were assembled in one day. While it was headquartered at the Piquette Avenue Plant, Ford Motor Company became the biggest U.S.-based automaker, and it would remain so until the mid-1920s. The factory was used by the company until 1910, when its car production activity was relocated to the new, bigger Highland Park Ford Plant.
Alberta is an unincorporated community in L'Anse Township of Baraga County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on US Highway 41 (US 41) about eight miles (13 km) south of the village of L'Anse at 46°38′37″N88°28′46″W. Alberta is the site of the Ford Center, managed by the Michigan Technological University College of Forest Resources and Environmental Science.
The Ford River Rouge complex is a Ford Motor Company automobile factory complex located in Dearborn, Michigan, along the River Rouge, upstream from its confluence with the Detroit River at Zug Island. Construction began in 1917, and when it was completed in 1928, it was the largest integrated factory in the world, surpassing Buick City, built in 1904.
This is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Wayne County, Michigan.
Pequaming is an unincorporated community in L'Anse Township of Baraga County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is located on a narrow point of land that juts into Keweenaw Bay. Although still partially inhabited, Pequaming is one of the largest ghost towns in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
The Ford Motor Co. Lamp Factory in Flat Rock, Michigan, was one of Henry Ford's village industries, which were small rural factories. It was the product of a unique collaboration between industrialist Ford and his lead designer, Albert Kahn. Albert Kahn Associates is a large Detroit firm that did extensive early and groundbreaking architectural design work for the Ford Motor Company.
The New Amsterdam Historic District is a historic district located in Detroit, Michigan. Buildings in this district are on or near three sequential east-west streets on the two blocks between Woodward Avenue and Second Avenue. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2001.
The Piquette Avenue Industrial Historic District is a historic district located along Piquette Street in Detroit, Michigan, from Woodward Avenue on the west to Hastings Street on the east. The district extends approximately one block south of Piquette to Harper, and one block north to the Grand Trunk Western Railroad Line. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2004.
The Lincoln Motor Company Plant was an automotive plant at 6200 West Warren Avenue in Detroit, Michigan, later known as the Detroit Edison Warren Service Center. The complex was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1978, due to its historic association with World War I Liberty engines and the Lincoln Motor Company. However, the main structures were demolished in 2003 and NHL designation was withdrawn in 2005.
Milwaukee Junction is an area in Detroit, Michigan, east of New Center. Located near the railroad junction of the Grand Trunk Western Railroad's predecessors Detroit, Grand Haven and Milwaukee Railway and the Chicago, Detroit and Canada Grand Trunk Junction, the area encompasses the streets of East Grand Boulevard to the north, St. Aubin St./Hamtramck Drive to the east, John R Street to the west, and the border following I-94 to the south. Due to the presence of numerous car companies within it at the turn of the 20th century, Milwaukee Junction is considered the "cradle of the Detroit auto industry".
The Packard Automotive Plant was an automobile-manufacturing factory in Detroit, Michigan, where luxury cars were made by the Packard Motor Car Company and later by the Studebaker-Packard Corporation. Demolition began on building 21 on October 27, 2022, and a second round of demolition began on building 28 on January 24, 2023, which was wrapped up by April 1st, however all demolition efforts by the City of Detroit halted, which stopped finishing demolition work of building 21. The Packard Plant currently sits empty and partially demolished, with many parcels still remaining.
The Ford Valve Plant is a factory building located at 235 East Main Street in Northville, Michigan. The plant was built as part of Henry Ford's vision of decentralizing manufacturing and integrating it into rural communities. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995.
The Nankin Mills Nature Center is a historic and nature interpretive center located at 33175 Ann Arbor Trail in Westland, Michigan. It was originally built as a grist mill, and was one of Henry Ford's "village industries." The mill was designated a Michigan State Historic Site in 1967.
The Schuyler Mill, also known as the Ford Soybean Plant Complex, is an old mill site that Henry Ford turned into one of his small village industry factories. It is located at 555-600 Michigan Avenue in Saline, Michigan, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996.
Henry Ford's Village Industries were small factories located in rural areas of Michigan. Ford developed his Village Industries in part to provide farm workers a stable source of income during the winter months.
The Mill Street–South Branch Raisin River Bridge is a bridge carrying Mill Street over the South Branch of the River Raisin in Brooklyn, Michigan. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.