San Diego, CA - Miniatures, Mission and a Mini-Miracle

Have we ever had a full day. We had planned one adventure, a visit to the Mission San Juan Capistrano, but then had adventure creep and added another museum on the way, dinner afterwards on a beautiful pier in Oceanside, CA. Then, there was a big ‘OOPS’ and a small miracle.

MINIATURE ENGINEERING CRAFTSMANSHIP MUSEUM

"A person who works with his hands is a laborer.

A person who works with his hands and his brain is a craftsman.

A person who works with his hands, his brain and his heart is an artist"

Louis Nizer (uncle)

A man who works with his mind, his heart an his billfold is an Entrepreneur.’

Joe Martin (nephew)

Joe Martin is the owner of Sherline Products, a manufacturer of precision miniature machine tools, the tools that many craftsmen use to make the projects displayed here. He thinks that movie and sports stars are rewarded way out of all proportion to their contribution to society compared to the craftsmen who actually make the things we use and enjoy daily and which make our lives easier and more productive. To further craftsmanship he has established the Joe Martin Foundation for Exceptional Craftsmanship through which he rewards excellent craftsmanship and has also opened a museum to display crafts of many kinds built and designed by many craftsmen. The museum is free and a marvelous jewel of a museum that is probably not known by many. And, that’s our goal for the day.

We awoke at our usual time, ate breakfast and then headed on over to Rose’s for Donuts before we headed north on our adventures. I’m only telling you about this dawdling because it will almost cause problems later in the day. Then the museum. What an amazing museum and all financed by Mr. Martin.

We met Harvey, the docent on duty and he showed us one of their new pieces, so new that they haven’t gotten it displayed yet.

It’s a model of the Cyclone Racer, a double roller coaster that used to be on Long Beach. Here is a picture I got online of an old postcard which shows it.

Seems that the builder of this model had just died and the family, not wanting to just toss this out, brought it to the museum. The original Cyclone Racer was built in 1930 by Harry Traver as a racing double track roller coaster. (How does one race in a roller coaster? Does everyone throw themselves forward going down the hill? Do you carry 50-lb bags of cement onto the ride with you? or is the racing aspect just a gimmick?) And, get this - the roller coaster was built on pilings over the water to add to the thrill. Harvey told us that his parents used to take the family to the Pike, the Long Beach amusement park where the Cyclone Racer (1930 - 1968) was, when he was young and they used to sit on the beach right near it. Once during WWII, his father lost, or had stolen, their week’s ration stamps. For a family of 5 that was a heady loss.

Here’s a picture of the inside of the museum. Not big - but, miniatures don’t need a big museum.

Now, I could describe each item in the museum but that would take more words than I want to write and you want to read.
Here are some spark plugs and a piston.

These parts are all cut from solid metal block and formed by the craftsperson who made them. They all work just like the actual motor or part. The crankshaft cranks, the pistons pist. Whatever.

Handcuffs that actually open and close.

Here’s a motor.

And, if you’ve got a working miniature motor, you’ve got to have a working miniature grease gun that squirts miniature grease.

Can you see Joshua Bell playing this? This would fit inside my hand. Look at those working hinges.

Here’s a more traditional miniature.

The usual word is ‘craftsman’ but here’s a Civil War Gatling gun built by a woman, Pam Weiss, who works for Sherline and actually did all the wiring and air lines in the museums workshop. It fires, it rolls and is real in every way except that it’s a little small to be effective.

Here is the museum website where they have an internet museum. You can see everything they have in the museum and more. However, I’d recommend visiting the museum in person if you ever get into the area since seeing it in person is so much better. I’m not interested in motors and gears and camshafts or what ever those parts are. But, I sure can appreciate the craftsmanship, skill, patience and time that goes into each of these miniatures.
http://www.craftsmanshipmuseum.com

ELGIN PARK

At the back of the museum in a small display with pictures on the wall called Elgin Park. It is a series of photos by a guy named Michael Paul Smith who has scratch-built about 17 small scale-model houses, has a plethora of small miniature cars and has imagined a town named Elgin Park, modeled on Sewickley, PA where he grew up. He has a FLICKR site where he posts all of his pictures, http://www.flickr.com/photos/24796741@N05/with/10711272073/.

We had a car like this when I was growing up. I can close my eyes and see all of us piling into it for our Sunday drive.

My favorite was this one. The can and trailer are sitting on a table in front of a bunch of real trees. Looks like a campground to me.

He has mixed and matched the cars to his buildings but then he takes it all a step further and here is where his imagination runs wild and he has created a whole village, actually using real city scapes. He finds a street that he likes that reflects his vision of America in 1964, then steps back a ways, sets up a table with a surface that looks like a street, arranges his cars on it and takes a photo of the cars in front of the cityscape. Since the cars are a ways back from the buildings, they look bigger than the buildings and, thus, are in the correct proportions. Got that? Well, if my words can’t quite describe this, go to his FLICKR page and see his actual pictures of his setup.

Here he is on one of his ‘sets.’ The trees are real, the house and cars are miniatures.

He uses real street scapes as his ‘set’ and mixes and matches his cars with his own buildings into these sets to create his Elgin Park. He doesn’t put people into his photos because he wants everyone who sees his photos to put themselves into the scenes. And, he is so good with his sets that it’s easy to imagine people coming out a house, getting into a car and driving off.

Interestingly, he does not own a car himself.

Marvelous museum with very interesting displays. But, it’s noon and time to move on to our second stop of the day, the Mission at San Juan Capistrano.