It's all possible through the Internet Public Library's WebINK, an Internet newsletter for kids. Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the automobile, "So You Want to Make a Car" is a virtual tour of an automotive plant, designed for children aged 7 years and older. Available on the World Wide Web at http://www.ipl.org/webink/autotour/, the virtual auto tour is sponsored by the Academic Outreach Program at the University of Michigan. Based on tours and interviews at Chrysler's Sterling Heights Assembly Plant in Sterling Heights, Mich., "So You Want to Make a Car" is a comprehensive look at today's car manufacturing process, focusing on the educational, personal and professional skills necessary to work in engineering, management and assembly. The tour is followed by a decision-making game where students take a spin at forming their own car companies and links to a variety of related "car" pages. The tour includes pictures, movies, and text of the assembly line from "getting the parts" to putting them together with the aid of robots. Interviews with union safety representatives and workers involved in assembly planning are provided.

Also available:

• links to other sites such as solar cars and other unique autos and their histories.
• Puzzles and other games
• automotive facts, including the history of cars, instructions on how to build an electric motor from household materials, and a visit to the Indy 500.
• automobiles in art and literature as well as in history and politics
• "Those Women Drivers"
• slogans used for pioneer cars by their manufacturers and dealers

The Internet Public Library is a project based at the UM School of Information and is partially supported by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The library began as a graduate student project in 1995 and is now staffed by professional librarians with assistance from students and volunteer librarians from around the world. The library maintains a collection of network-based ready reference works, responds to reference queries, creates resources for children and young adults, evaluates and categorizes resources on the Internet, and provides a space for exhibitions.