Corning is famed for being the home of the glassware giant that spawned Pyrex, Corelle, and the space shuttle’s windshield. It began life as a settlement by Erastus Corning in 1835 before becoming a village 13 years later. Today, Corning is the town’s largest employer with its headquarters here. Cultural Read more
Syracuse is the place to go to visit a museum on the canals and commercial shipping lanes of the Great Lakes, but go to Toledo‘s National Museum of the Great Lakes for additional learning about the culture and histories around the Great Lakes. Circumnavigating the eastern lakes should really be Read more
Toledo sits on the Maumee River and graces its banks with museums like Imagination Station, the National Museum of the Great Lakes, and the Toledo Museum of History. It was famous for being a glassware manufacturing hub in the 1880s. Toledo was embroiled in an internal conflict between Ohio and Read more
The Great Lakes Science Center was disappointingly small, so I took the extra time to do a bonus round at the neighboring Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. I’m not big on music, but I do have the Rolling Stones and The Beatles CDs in my car – Read more
The late Queen Elizabeth II had reigned for so long that people have lived and died in 70 years. Although there was a quick succession of death, ascension, abdication, and coronation in the first third of the 20th century, there hasn’t been a change of guard in recent memory. Canadians Read more
Parking costs $12 a pop but the museum itself is free. The giant atrium in the centre of the building reminds me of the British Museum. It probably looks exactly like it was proposed in concept sketches. The Art Lens exhibit is the first time I’ve seen an art museum Read more
There are many reasons to visit Cleveland, I wanted to see its excellent museum of art, the quirky women’s air and space museum, and its Art Deco buildings. Yes, Art Deco buildings. If you really want to see relics of the roaring 20s, and the splendour of old American public Read more
The Michigan History Center is free on Sundays in Lansing, Michigan’s state capital. I don’t think the downstairs gallery on prehistoric Michigan and nature is worth too much time. After all, Michigan is known to be an industrial state at the heart of America, so modern history on its manufacturing Read more
I have mixed feelings about taking the train in Canada. Although Via Rail may feel normal to the uninitiated traveler, it’s at least odd even by American standards. Where to begin? I traveled between Ottawa and Toronto, about 4.5 hours each way, but there was no buffet car. The only Read more
Gerald Ford was the only president in American history to assume office without running either for the office of president or vice-president after Richard Nixon became the first president to resign from office. Although John F. Kennedy’s legacy was focused on US-Soviet relations, Ford’s presidency was mired in domestic controversy. Read more