Visit to Massachussetts

We drove into Massachusetts on Thursday. The weather was cool, wet & getting wetter. Michael was disappointed in the Springfield Armory Museum. He would have preferred fewer guns & more on the machines that manufactured them. No, the Simpsons were not to be found either.
We then headed to Lowell to visit The American Textile Museum. A great museum, wonderful displays, if somewhat formal and inaccessible.
then we drove to Waltham , had a great meal a good sleep & up at a civilised hour to get to the Charles River Museum.A bit haphazard, almost as if waiting to be sorted out, but far more informative and accessible than the others. Steam engines were overlooked by clocks & watches!
American museums appear to receive little public funding , and so rely on endowments form private donors and the work of (mostly) volunteers. Michael had wanted to visit all these industrial museums as they represent the technology that made this such a great nation in the previous 3 centuries. As an educator, I see the value of museums as important parts of a cultural heritage and community knowledge, but unfortunately amricans will miss out on this knowledge. Like Australia, the US is suffering a skills shortage, and like Australia, governments have failed to invest in education.