The Henry Ford is proud to announce its collaboration with Hitachi on the Hitachi Inspire STEM Education Program. With the loan of a benchtop Scanning Electron Microscope (TM3030) with an Oxford Instrument Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectrometer (EDX), the institution will be better equipped to preserve and restore items within The Henry Ford Archive of American Innovation™, develop education programming for visitors, showcase STEM careers for the more than 240,000 annual visiting schoolchildren, and enrich the curriculum for its on-site Charter High School, The Henry Ford Academy.
With the help of Hitachi technology, the conservation team’s ability to identify and authenticate the composition of materials on the broad range of artifacts within the collection. This knowledge would help to develop appropriate conservation treatments for artifacts and produce accurate reproductions when needed. Potential applications include a material analysis of the spark igniters and materials used in the 1896 Ford Quadricycle Runabout, the first car built by Henry Ford, and determining if the bolts in an early Galvanometer (late 19th century) are ivory or bone.