Authenticity Reconsidered, II: Reconstructing a London Jewelers in the Shadow of the Rouge Plant
Authenticity Reconsidered, II: Reconstructing a London Jewelers in the Shadow of the Rouge Plant
Academic Year:
2013 - 2014 (June 1, 2013 through May 31, 2014)
Funding Requested:
$2,000.00
Project Dates:
-
Applicant(s):
Overview of the Project:
I am requesting $2,000 in CRLT funding to support travel related to a publication/ presentation project that will require primary resource research in Manchester, England. As a result of a previous research trip to London, I have learned of a repository in Manchester which holds the personal papers of Henry Ford's English agent Herbert Morton, the man who negotiated the purchase and supervised the dismantling of the Sir John Bennett Jewelry Store and Ford's other major English building purchase—two sixteenth-century stone cottages near Oxford that were "married" as a single building when Ford moved them to Dearborn. A colleague in the UK has traveled to Manchester and suggests that there is considerable material in Morton's papers to tell the "English side" of these purchases. I propose to travel to Manchester to examine these materials, thus allowing me to complete my research and write up the Bennett Store and transition to a book proposal to tell the larger story that stems from the problematic nature of Ford's preservation work. The project I propose relates directly to my teaching in the Museum Studies Minor (LS&A) and classroom discussions of the unique nature of original works of creation, the quintessential nature of experiencing those objects in person, and issues relating to originality and authenticity.