American Precision Museum

[Gordon Cook]

We visited the American Precision Museum in Windsor, VT last weekend. It is located in a mid 1800s water powered factory building and has a collection of early machine tools mostly involved with how industry transitioned from hand made and custom fitted parts to precisely machined and interchangeable parts. This area of Vermont became a hotbed of innovation in the mid-19th century in inventing new and clever machine tools, originally for the firearms industry, but spinning off into all areas of manufacturing. The museum is staffed and run by volunteers.
There is also a collection of miniature machine tools made by one individual that all work and will have you wondering how he did it.
For anyone who is interested, it is a small but worthwhile museum to visit. You can also experience the covered bridge which spans the Connecticut river there between VT and NH. Yeah, it's a big one!
This coming weekend is the last weekend they will be open this year (no heat) and will be hosting a large maker and model engineering show.  www.americanprecision.org

[Bill Reidy]

Now that's a neat find.  Thanks Gawdon!

[Philip Marshall]

I can recommend the American Precision Museum as well. They have a really neat collection of early machine tools, and the story they have to tell will be of interest to anyone with a love for New England industrial history (which I expect includes most of us). Windsor is also an interesting town in its own right, Vermont's first capital as I understand.

[Mike the Choochoo Nix]

I have also been there, I was impressed by the video about truly interchangeable parts, and some of the very old lathes.
Mike Nix