Ridgefield became a showplace. Inside and out it was restored to its original condition. It dated from around the time of the Revolution. On one stair landing, George made a musket rack - complete with about a dozen old muskets standing in it - ready for Minutemen hastily departing to join General Wooster down the street - as he often remarked. His ancient love of blacksmithing surfaced anew at Ridgefield, and we built him an oldtime blacksmith shop in a connector breezeway between two main portions of the house.      

     Here he had a "Great Bellows" (an original he had picked up) and a permanent stone forge. He was getting older by now, and I don't ever recall him doing much forging here, but I have little doubt that sub-conscious influences here fueled my later ventures in smithing... George mostly used to come down to his forge in the morning after they moved in (he was partly retired) and fire up and cook himself a great big breakfast steak!

     Off the smithy, was a huge, two-storey wing he built to house some of his monstrous collection of tools. Included were tools of all types and every period, which he had amassed during his lifetime. There were ancient carpenter's tools, and planes, and "slicks", and "commanders" and "gimlets" and on and on. (George's favorite drink was a vodka Gimlet and his favorite quote when he tossed one off , with a wink to the knowing, was from Shakespeare: "'Tis but a little gimlet to let the augur through..").

     He had antique bed lathes, and belt-powered production tools from the days of line-drive factories... In short, he had it all - and mostly he had at least two of everything. A perennial thorn in his side was the artist Eric Sloane, who lived upstate and was always trying to buy or swap (!) George out of various items. I don't think George liked Eric too much and went out of his way to frustrate him at every turn. Sloane, let it be said, was a very famous painter of barns and the oldtime scene, and co-founder of a museum of American tools up at Kent, CT - still there last time I checked.

     But it couldn't hold a candle to George's collection.

     The Smithsonian heard of his collection - and they, too - made a pass at it - and George sent them packing...

     To get a bit ahead of our story, perhaps the only outfit he ever gave an ear to on this matter was the Henry Ford Museum out in Dearborn. Before he died, he had worked out particulars with them - and when he died, and the final disposition of his goods was made (more anon), the Ford Museum sent three over-the-road 18-wheelers to haul off their share and paid Ruthie, his widow, handsomely for it. I believe the thousands of items they took were later housed either in their own designated George W. Rhine wing, or as a designated group of items in the George W. Rhine Collection. If I ever get back out that way, I shall surely look it up...