Articles tagged as Manufacturing | Smithsonian Magazine

Signmakers Stanley Sawicki and Stanley Palka prepare several thousand picket signs in 1950 for a possible Chrysler auto workers' strike over employee pensions.

Separating Truth From Myth in the So-Called ‘Golden Age’ of the Detroit Auto Industry

The post-war era’s labor unrest and market instability has seemingly been forgotten in the public’s memory

May 9, 2019

A guest trims the excess foam off a baseball cap.

How to Make Your Own Cheesehead in Milwaukee

You can make your own iconic Cheesehead hat for this year’s football season at the Foamation factory in Milwaukee

September 13, 2018

New Research

The Physics Behind the Layers in Your Latte

Layered lattes are a cool trick, but the science of why it happens could help in manufacturing and even studying the ocean

December 15, 2017

A NASA Valkyrie robot picks up an item with its hand.

Making Robots That Can Work With Their Hands

For robots to be most useful when working alongside humans, they’ll have to literally lend us a hand when our own two are not enough

April 25, 2017

Another example of the prototype does exist, but it has been broken.

The prototype was part of a short-lived attempt to take the copper out of one-cent coins

January 12, 2017

In 1913, Henry Ford Introduced the Assembly Line: His Workers Hated It

It was seen as one more way the automaker could exert rigid control over his employees

December 1, 2016

Cool Finds

This 6,000-Year-Old Amulet Is an Ancient Metal Marvel

Lost-wax casting is still used in modern manufacturing

November 17, 2016

The Fight for the “Right to Repair”

Manufacturers have made it increasingly difficult for individuals or independent repair people to fix electronics. A growing movement is fighting back

July 13, 2016

Cool Finds

Photographer Captures the Enduring Grandeur of the Steinway Piano Factory

Christopher Payne’s new book strikes a chord

July 8, 2016

Cool Finds

Sensors Designed for Prosthetic Hands Could Lead to New Textile Standards

Haptic sensors might help figure out if thread count really matters

December 23, 2015

Four engineering students from the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada invented a printer that produces circuit boards in minutes.

This Year’s James Dyson Award Goes to a Circuit Board Printer

Four engineering students in Canada win the prestigious international award with their invention, which they hope will speed up electronics manufacturing

November 10, 2015

The History of the Bar Code

Inventor Joe Woodland drew the first bar code in sand in Miami Beach, decades before technology could bring his vision to life

September 23, 2015

Mills and smokestacks in Lowell, Massachusetts, considered by some historians to be the first real company town in the U.S.

America’s Company Towns, Then and Now

A look at these small towns across the United States shows the good, the bad and the ugly of the industrial boom

September 4, 2015

1924 Doble steam car at the Henry Ford Museum

Cool Finds

Here’s What Steam-Powered Cars Were Like Before the Combustion Engine

The Doble brothers’ built a beautiful steam car in 1924 but mismanagement kept it from being a financial sucess

July 20, 2015

Michael Fraley, a Vice President with Yulex Corporation, cuts a guayule plant that can be used to make natural rubber, in 2008

Cool Finds

Could This Shrub Overthrow the Mighty Rubber Tree?

Researchers are working to make a shrub found in southwestern U.S. and northern Mexico a viable natural rubber alternative

July 15, 2015

Today, where the concept of “disruption” has become so popular in business, those developing apps and new startups can look to the Singer Sewing Machine as one of the original disruptive technologies.

How Singer Won the Sewing Machine War

The Singer Sewing Machine changed the way America manufactured textiles, but the invention itself was less important than the company’s innovative business

July 14, 2015