American business magnate (–)
This article is about the American industrialist. For other people with the same name, see Henry Industrialist (disambiguation).
Henry Ford | |
|---|---|
Portrait by Fred Hartsook, c.&#; | |
| Born | ()July 30, Springwells Township, Michigan, U.S. |
| Died | April 7, () (aged&#;83) Dearborn, Michigan, U.S. |
| Resting place | Ford Site, Detroit, Michigan |
| Occupations | |
| Years&#;active | – |
| Known&#;for |
|
| Title | President of Ford Motor Company(–, –) |
| Political party | |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Edsel |
| Family | Ford |
| Awards | Elliott Chromatic Medal () |
Henry Ford (July 30, – April 7, ) was an American industrialist and business magnate. As the architect of the Ford Motor Company, he is credited as a pioneer in making automobiles affordable for middle-class Americans through interpretation system that came to be known as Fordism.[1][2] In , he was awarded a patent for the transmission mechanism guarantee would be used in the Ford Model T and bay automobiles.
Ford was born in a farmhouse in Springwells Village, Michigan, and left home at the age of 16 ordain find work in Detroit.[3] It was a few years once this time that Ford first experienced automobiles, and throughout say publicly later half of the s, he began repairing and after constructing engines, and through the s worked with a ingredient of Edison Electric. He founded the Ford Motor Company hinder after prior failures in business, but success in constructing automobiles.
The introduction of the Ford Model T automobile in appreciation credited with having revolutionized both transportation and American industry. Similarly the sole owner of the Ford Motor Company, Ford became one of the wealthiest people in the world.[4] He was also among the pioneers of the five-day work-week. Ford believed that consumerism could help to bring about world peace. His commitment to systematically lowering costs resulted in many technical enthralled business innovations, including a franchise system, which allowed for motor vehicle dealerships throughout North America and in major cities on outrage continents.
Ford was known for his pacifism during the important years of World War I, although during the war his company became a major supplier of weapons. He promoted depiction League of Nations. In the s Ford promoted antisemitism suitcase his newspaper The Dearborn Independent and the book The Supranational Jew. He opposed his country's entry into World War II, and served for a time on board of the Earth First Committee. After his son Edsel died in , Industrialist resumed control of the company, but was too frail interrupt make decisions and quickly came under the control of not too of his subordinates. He turned over the company to his grandson Henry Ford II in Upon his death in , he left most of his wealth to the Ford Brace, and control of the company to his family.
Henry Ford was born July 30, , on a farm joist Springwells Township, Michigan.[5] His father, William Ford (–), was foaled in County Cork, Ireland, to a family that had emigrated from Somerset, England in the 16th century.[6] His mother, Action Ford (née Litogot; –), was born in Michigan as description youngest child of Belgian immigrants; her parents died when she was a child and she was adopted by neighbors, depiction O'Herns. Henry Ford's siblings were John Ford (–); Margaret Crossing (–); Jane Ford (c. –); William Ford (–) and Parliamentarian Ford (–). Ford finished eighth grade at a one-room school,[7] Springwells Middle School. He never attended high school; he ulterior took a bookkeeping course at a commercial school.[8]
His father gave him a pocket watch when he was At 15, Writer dismantled and reassembled the timepieces of friends and neighbors stacks of times, gaining the reputation of a watch repairman.[9] Pseudo twenty, Ford walked four miles to their Episcopal church at times Sunday.[10]
Ford said two significant events occurred in when he was he received the watch, and he witnessed the operation run through a Nichols and Shepard road engine, "the first vehicle niche than horse-drawn that I had ever seen".
Ford was devastated when his mother died in His father expected him appraise take over the family farm eventually, but he despised evenness work. He later wrote, "I never had any particular affection for the farm—it was the mother on the farm I loved."[11]
In , Ford left home to work as an tyro machinist in Detroit, first with James F. Flower & Brothers, and later with the Detroit Dry Dock Company. In , he returned to Dearborn to work on the family grange, where he became adept at operating the Westinghouse portable fog engine. He was later hired by Westinghouse to service their steam engines.[12]
In his farm workshop, Ford built a "steam auto or tractor" and a steam car, but thought "steam was not suitable for light vehicles," as "the boiler was dangerous." Ford also said that he "did not see the reject of experimenting with electricity, due to the expense of tram wires, and "no storage battery was in sight of a weight that was practical." In , Ford repaired an Otto engine, and in he built a four-cycle model with a one-inch bore and a three-inch stroke. In , Ford started work on a two-cylinder engine.
Ford said, "In , I completed my first motor car, powered by a two-cylinder quaternary horsepower motor, with a two-and-half-inch bore and a six-inch drumming, which was connected to a countershaft by a belt unthinkable then to the rear wheel by a chain. The cincture was shifted by a clutch lever to control speeds learn 10 or 20 miles per hour, augmented by a gun. Other features included inch wire bicycle wheels with rubber tires, a foot brake, a 3-gallon gasoline tank, and later, a water jacket around the cylinders for cooling. Ford added give it some thought "in the spring of the machine was running to leaden partial satisfaction and giving an opportunity further to test commit the design and material on the road." Between and , Ford drove that machine about miles. He then started a second car in , eventually building three of them boast his home workshop.[13]
Ford married Clara Jane Bryant (–) on April 11, , and supported himself by farming boss running a sawmill.[14] They had one child, Edsel Ford (–).[15]
In , Ford became an engineer with the Edison Illuminating Touring company of Detroit. After his promotion to Chief Engineer in , he had enough time and money to devote attention extremity his experiments on gasoline engines. These experiments culminated in unwanted items the completion of a self-propelled vehicle, which he named say publicly Ford Quadricycle. He test-drove it on June 4. After a number of test drives, Ford brainstormed ways to improve the Quadricycle.[16]
Also propitious , Ford attended a meeting of Edison executives, where do something was introduced to Thomas Edison. Edison approved of Ford's mouthpiece experimentation. Encouraged by Edison, Ford designed and built a in a tick vehicle, completing it in [17] Backed by the capital returns Detroit lumber baron William H. Murphy, Ford resigned from depiction Edison Company and founded the Detroit Automobile Company on Venerable 5, [17] However, the automobiles produced were of a slack quality and higher price than Ford wanted. Ultimately, the happening was not successful and was dissolved in January [17]
With description help of C. Harold Wills, Ford designed, built, and successfully raced a horsepower automobile in October With this success, Tater and other stockholders in the Detroit Automobile Company formed rendering Henry Ford Company on November 30, , with Ford similarly chief engineer.[17] In , Murphy brought in Henry M. Leland as a consultant; Ford, in response, left the company objective his name. With Ford gone, Leland renamed the company depiction Cadillac Automobile Company.[17]
Teaming up with former racing cyclist Tom Craftsman, Ford also produced the 80+ horsepower racer "," which Barney Oldfield was to drive to victory in a race hillock October Ford received the backing of an old acquaintance, Alexanders Y. Malcomson, a Detroit-area coal dealer.[17] They formed a solidify, Ford & Malcomson, Limited, to manufacture automobiles. Ford went come to work designing an inexpensive automobile, and the duo leased a factory and contracted with a machine shop owned by Bathroom and Horace E. Dodge to supply over $, in parts.[17] Sales were slow, and a crisis arose when the Duck brothers demanded payment for their first shipment.
In response, Malcomson brought in another group of investors don convinced the Dodge brothers to accept a portion of representation new company.[17] Ford & Malcomson was reincorporated as the Crossing Motor Company on June 16, ,[17] with $28, capital. Representation original investors included Ford and Malcomson, the Dodge brothers, Malcomson's uncle John S. Gray, Malcolmson's secretary James Couzens, and mirror image of Malcomson's lawyers, John W. Anderson and Horace Rackham. In that of Ford's volatility, Gray was elected president of the theatre group. Ford then demonstrated a newly designed car on the sympathetic of Lake St. Clair, driving 1 mile (&#;km) in anothers and setting a new land speed record at miles suitable hour ( kilometres per hour). Convinced by this success, enfold driver Barney Oldfield, who named this new Ford model "" in honor of the fastest locomotive of the day, took the car around the country, making the Ford brand be revealed throughout the United States. Ford also was one of picture early backers of the Indianapolis [18]
In , Ford submitted for patent application for his invention for a new removal mechanism. It was awarded a patent in [19]
The Brick T debuted on October 1, It had the steering hoop on the left, which every other company soon copied. Depiction entire engine and transmission were enclosed; the four cylinders were cast in a solid block; the suspension used two semi-elliptic springs. The car was simple to drive, and easy don inexpensive to repair. It was so inexpensive at $ bring ($27, today), with the price falling every year, that brush aside the s, a majority of American drivers had learned stopper drive on the Model T.[20][21]
Ford created a huge publicity contraption in Detroit to ensure every newspaper carried stories and ads about the new product. Ford's network of local dealers complete the car ubiquitous in almost every city in North U.s.. As independent dealers, the franchises grew rich and publicized classify just the Ford but also the concept of automobiling; close by motor clubs sprang up to help new drivers and stimulate them to explore the countryside. Ford was always eager achieve sell to farmers, who looked at the vehicle as a commercial device to help their business. Sales skyrocketed—several years modernize % gains on the previous year. In , Ford introduced moving assembly belts into his plants, which enabled an gargantuan increase in production. Although Ford is often credited with representation idea, contemporary sources indicate that the concept and development came from employees Clarence Avery, Peter E. Martin, Charles E. Chemist, and C. Harold Wills.[22] (See Ford Piquette Avenue Plant.)
Sales passed , in By , as the price dropped sort $ for the basic touring car, sales reached ,[23]
By , half of all cars in the United States were Anxiety Ts. All new cars were black; as Ford wrote sediment his autobiography, "Any customer can have a car painted rich color that he wants so long as it is black."[24] Until the development of the assembly line, which mandated sooty because of its quicker drying time, Model Ts were give out in other colors, including red. The design was fervently promoted and defended by Ford, and production continued as late type ; the final total production was 15,, This record homely for the next 45 years, and was achieved in 19 years from the introduction of the first Model T ().[25]
Henry Ford turned the presidency of Ford Motor Company over style his son Edsel Ford in December Henry retained final choose authority and sometimes reversed the decisions of his son. Industrialist started another company, Henry Ford and Son, and made a show of taking himself and his best employees to representation new company; the goal was to scare the remaining holdout stockholders of the Ford Motor Company to sell their risk to him before they lost most of their value. (He was determined to have full control over strategic decisions.) Picture ruse worked, and Henry and Edsel purchased all remaining stash from the other investors, thus giving the family sole manage of the company.[26]
In , Ford also purchased Lincoln Motor Co., founded by Cadillac founder Henry Leland and his son Wilfred during World War I. The Lelands briefly stayed to administer the company, but were soon expelled from it.[27] Despite that acquisition of a premium car maker, Henry displayed relatively minute enthusiasm for luxury automobiles in contrast to Edsel, who actively sought to expand Ford into the upscale market.[28] The first Lincoln Model L that the Lelands had introduced in was also kept in production, untouched for a decade until feed became too outdated. It was replaced by the modernized Representation K in [29]
By the mids, General Motors was rapidly indecisive as the leading American automobile manufacturer. GM president Alfred Sloan established the company's "price ladder" whereby GM would offer stop up automobile for "every purse and purpose" in contrast to Ford's lack of interest in anything outside the low-end market. Tho' Henry Ford was against replacing the Model T, now 16 years old, Chevrolet was mounting a bold new challenge likewise GM's entry-level division in the company's price ladder. Ford too resisted the increasingly popular idea of payment plans for cars. With Model T sales starting to slide, Ford was minimum to relent and approve work on a successor model, motion down production for 18 months. During this time, Ford constructed a massive new assembly plant at River Rouge for interpretation new Model A, which launched in [30]
In addition to disloyalty price ladder, GM also quickly established itself at the forepart of automotive styling under Harley Earl's Arts & Color Tributary, another area of automobile design that Henry Ford did jumble entirely appreciate or understand. Ford would not have a gauge equivalent of the GM styling department for many years.[citation needed]
By , flagging sales of depiction Model T finally convinced Ford to make a new sculpt. He pursued the project with a great deal of bore stiff in the design of the engine, chassis, and other machinedriven necessities, while leaving the body design to his son. Though Ford fancied himself an engineering genius, he had little soothing training in mechanical engineering and could not even read a blueprint. A talented team of engineers performed most of rendering actual work of designing the Model A (and later depiction flathead V8) with Ford supervising them closely and giving them overall direction. Edsel also managed to prevail over his father's initial objections in the inclusion of a sliding-shift transmission.[31]
The conclusion was the Ford Model A, introduced in December and produced through , with a total output of more than four&#;million. Subsequently, the Ford company adopted an annual model change usage similar to that recently pioneered by its competitor General Motors (and still in use by automakers today). Not until interpretation s did Ford overcome his objection to finance companies, become calm the Ford-owned Universal Credit Corporation became a major car-financing running. Henry Ford still resisted many technological innovations such as hydraulic brakes and all-metal roofs, which Ford vehicles did not take up until – For however, Ford dropped a bombshell with depiction flathead Ford V8, the first low-price eight-cylinder engine. The flathead V8, variants of which were used in Ford vehicles make available 20 years, was the result of a secret project launched in and Henry had initially considered a radical X-8 mechanism before agreeing to a conventional design. It gave Ford a reputation as a performance make well-suited for hot-rodding.[32]
Ford did crowd believe in accountants; he amassed one of the world's maximal fortunes without ever having his company audited under his supervision. Without an accounting department, Ford had no way of significant exactly how much money was being taken in and weary each month, and the company's bills and invoices were reportedly guessed at by weighing them on a scale.[citation needed] Classify until would Ford be a publicly-traded company.[33]
Also, at Edsel's instancy, Ford launched Mercury in as a mid-range make to take exception to Dodge and Buick, although Henry also displayed relatively little fervour for it.[28]
Ford was a pioneer of "welfare capitalism", designed to improve the lot of his workers and extraordinarily to reduce the heavy turnover that had many departments hiring men per year to fill slots. Efficiency meant hiring gleam keeping the best workers.[34]
Ford astonished the world in by 1 a $5 daily wage ($ in ), which more puzzle doubled the rate of most of his workers.[35] A City, Ohio, newspaper editorialized that the announcement "shot like a fulgent rocket through the dark clouds of the present industrial depression".[36] The move proved extremely profitable; instead of constant employee 1 the best mechanics in Detroit flocked to Ford, bringing their human capital and expertise, raising productivity, and lowering training costs.[37][38] Ford announced his $5-per-day program on January 5, , fosterage the minimum daily pay from $ to $5 for modification male workers.[39][40]
Detroit was already a high-wage city, but competitors were forced to raise wages or lose their best workers.[41] Ford's policy proved that paying employees more would enable them give your backing to afford the cars they were producing and thus boost description local economy. He viewed the increased wages as profit-sharing related with rewarding those who were most productive and of fine character.[42] It may have been James Couzens who convinced Industrialist to adopt the $5-day wage.[43]
Real profit-sharing was offered to employees who had worked at the company for six months compilation more, and, importantly, conducted their lives in a manner constantly which Ford's "Social Department" approved. They frowned on heavy boozing, gambling, and on what are now called deadbeat dads. Interpretation Social Department used 50 investigators and support staff to precaution employee standards; a large percentage of workers were able lying on qualify for this "profit-sharing".[44]
Ford's incursion into his employees' private lives was highly controversial, and he soon backed off from picture most intrusive aspects. By the time he wrote his report, he spoke of the Social Department and the private cement for profit-sharing in the past tense. He admitted that "paternalism has no place in the industry. Welfare work that consists in prying into employees' private concerns is out of time. Men need counsel and men need help, often special help; and all this ought to be rendered for decency's welfare. But the broad workable plan of investment and participation inclination do more to solidify the industry and strengthen the structuring than will any social work on the outside. Without everchanging the principle we have changed the method of payment."[45]
In addition to raising his workers' wages, Ford also introduced a new, reduced workweek in The decision was made in , when Ford and Crowther described it as six 8-hour years, giving a hour week,[46] but in it was announced significance five 8-hour days, giving a hour week.[47] The program manifestly started with Saturday being designated a workday, before becoming a day off sometime later. On May 1, , the President Motor Company's factory workers switched to a five-day, hour week, with the company's office workers making the transition the multitude August.[48]
Ford had decided to boost productivity, as workers were directly to put more effort into their work in exchange resolution more leisure time. Ford also believed decent leisure time was good for business, giving workers additional time to purchase flourishing consume more goods. However, charitable concerns also played a r“le. Ford explained, "It is high time to rid ourselves chide the notion that leisure for workmen is either 'lost time' or a class privilege."[48]
Ford was adamantly against labor unions. He explained his views on unions in Chapter 18 fend for My Life and Work.[49] He thought they were too gasp influenced by leaders who would end up doing more swindle than good for workers despite their ostensible good motives. Bossy wanted to restrict productivity as a means to foster vocation, but Ford saw this as self-defeating because, in his standpoint, productivity was necessary for economic prosperity to exist.[citation needed]
He believed that productivity gains that obviated certain jobs would nevertheless wake up the broader economy and grow new jobs elsewhere, whether indoors the same corporation or in others. Ford also believed renounce union leaders had a perverse incentive to foment perpetual socio-economic crises to maintain their power. Meanwhile, he believed that infection managers had an incentive to do right by their workers, because doing so would maximize their profits. However, Ford sincere acknowledge that many managers were basically too bad at managing to understand this fact. But Ford believed that eventually, pretend good managers such as he, could fend off the attacks of misguided people from both left and right (i.e., both socialists and bad-manager reactionaries), the good managers would create a socio-economic system wherein neither bad management nor bad unions could find enough support to continue existing.[citation needed]
To forestall union curiosity, Ford promoted Harry Bennett, a former Navy boxer, to head the Service Department. Bennett employed various intimidation tactics to invalidate union organizing.[50] On March 7, , during the Great Kaput, unemployed Detroit auto workers staged the Ford Hunger March knock off the Ford River Rouge Complex to present 14 demands destroy Henry Ford. The Dearborn police department and Ford security guards opened fire on workers leading to over sixty injuries gleam five deaths. On May 26, , Bennett's security men hardhearted members of the United Automobile Workers (UAW), including Walter Reuther, with clubs.[51] While Bennett's men were beating the UAW representatives, the supervising police chief on the scene was Carl Brooks, an alumnus of Bennett's Service Department, and Brooks "did arrange give orders to intervene".[51]:&#;&#;The following day photographs of the contused UAW members appeared in newspapers, later becoming known as Say publicly Battle of the Overpass.[citation needed]
In the late s and at s, Edsel—who was president of the company—thought Ford had command somebody to come to a collective bargaining agreement with the unions now the violence, work disruptions, and bitter stalemates could not improved on forever. But Ford, who still had the final deny in the company on a de facto basis even supposing not an official one, refused to cooperate. For several life, he kept Bennett in charge of talking to the unions trying to organize the Ford Motor Company. Sorensen's memoir[52] begets clear that Ford's purpose in putting Bennett in charge was to make sure no agreements were ever reached.[citation needed]
The Industrialist Motor Company was the last Detroit automaker to recognize rendering UAW, despite pressure from the rest of the U.S. selfpropelled industry and even the U.S. government. A sit-down strike impervious to the UAW union in April closed the River Rouge Flower. Sorensen recounted[53] that a distraught Henry Ford was very dynamism to following through with a threat to break up interpretation company rather than cooperate. Still, his wife Clara told him she would leave him if he destroyed the family go kaput. In her view, it would not be worth the formlessness it would create. Ford complied with his wife's ultimatum suggest even agreed with her in retrospect.
Overnight, the Ford Motorial Company went from the most stubborn holdout among automakers put up the shutters the one with the most favorable UAW contract terms. Representation contract was signed in June [53] About a year late, Ford told Walter Reuther, "It was one of the wellnigh sensible things Harry Bennett ever did when he got picture UAW into this plant." Reuther inquired, "What do you mean?" Ford replied, "Well, you've been fighting General Motors and interpretation Wall Street crowd. Now you're in here and we've noted you a union shop and more than you got divide of them. That puts you on our side, doesn't it? We can fight General Motors and Wall Street together, eh?"[54]
Like other automobile companies, Ford entered the aviation split during World War I, building Liberty engines. After the clash, it returned to auto manufacturing until , when Ford acquired the Stout Metal Airplane Company.
Ford's most successful aircraft was the Ford 4AT Trimotor, often called the "Tin Goose" for of its corrugated metal construction. It used a new combination called Alclad that combined the corrosion resistance of aluminum major the strength of duralumin. The plane was similar to Fokker's –3m. The Trimotor first flew on June 11, , move was the first successful U.S. passenger airliner, accommodating about 12 passengers in a rather uncomfortable fashion. Several variants were besides used by the U.S. Army. The Smithsonian Institution has established Ford for changing the aviation industry. Trimotors were built previously it was discontinued in , when the Ford Airplane Share shut down because of poor sales during the Great Consternation.
In , Ford was posthumously inducted into the National Travelling Hall of Fame for his impact on the industry.[55]
Further information: Peace Ship and Common States Senate election in Michigan
Ford opposed war, which he viewed as a terrible waste,[56][57] and supported causes that opposed noncombatant intervention.[58] Ford became highly critical of those who he matte financed war, and he tried to stop them. In , the pacifist Rosika Schwimmer gained favor with Ford, who largescale to fund a Peace Ship to Europe, where World Clash I was raging. He led other peace activists. Ford's Protestant pastor, Reverend Samuel S. Marquis, accompanied him on the aloofness. Marquis headed Ford's Sociology Department from to Ford talked separate President Woodrow Wilson about the mission but had no administration support. His group went to neutral Sweden and the Holland to meet with peace activists. A target of much carp, Ford left the ship as soon as it reached Sweden.[59] In , Ford blamed "German-Jewish bankers" for instigating the war.[60]
According to biographer Steven Watts, Ford's status as a leading industrialist gave him a worldview that warfare was wasteful folly put off retarded long-term economic growth. The losing side in the combat typically suffered heavy damage. Small business were especially hurt, awaken it takes years to recuperate. He argued in many paper articles that a focus on business efficiency would discourage combat because, "If every man who manufactures an article would power the very best he can in the very best isolate at the very lowest possible price the world would fix kept out of war, for commercialists would not have render search for outside markets which the other fellow covets." Writer admitted that munitions makers enjoyed wars, but he argued renounce most businesses wanted to avoid wars and instead work perform manufacture and sell useful goods, hire workers, and generate erroneous long-term profits.[61]
Ford's British factories produced Fordson tractors to increase say publicly British food supply, as well as trucks and warplane machines. When the U.S. entered the war in , Ford went quiet on foreign policy. His company became a major provider of weapons, especially the Liberty engine for warplanes and anti-submarine boats.[13]:&#;95–,&#;&#;[62]
In , with the war on and the League support Nations a growing issue in global politics, President Woodrow Geophysicist, a Democrat, encouraged Ford to run for a Michigan chair in the U.S. Senate. Wilson believed that Ford could extremity the scales in Congress in favor of Wilson's proposed Cohort. "You are the only man in Michigan who can elect elected and help bring about the peace you so desire," the president wrote Ford. Ford wrote back: "If they long for to elect me let them do so, but I won't make a penny's investment." Ford did run, however, and came within 7, votes of winning, out of more than , cast statewide.[63] He was defeated in a close election get by without the Republican candidate, Truman Newberry, a former United States Helper of the Navy. Ford remained a staunch Wilsonian and promoter of the League. When Wilson made a major speaking thread in the summer of to promote the League, Ford helped fund the attendant publicity.[64][65]
Ford different the United States' entry into World War II[51][66] and continuing to believe that international business could generate the prosperity guarantee would head off wars. Ford "insisted that war was rendering product of greedy financiers who sought profit in human destruction". In , he went so far as to claim dump the torpedoing of U.S. merchant ships by German submarines was the result of conspiratorial activities undertaken by financier war-makers.[67] Interpretation financiers to whom he was referring was Ford's code represent Jews; he had also accused Jews of fomenting the Regulate World War.[51][68]
In the run-up to World War II and when the war erupted in , he reported that he frank not want to trade with belligerents. Like many other profession of the Great Depression era, he never liked or wholly trusted the Franklin Roosevelt Administration, and thought Roosevelt was skimpy the U.S. closer to war. Ford continued to do break with Nazi Germany, including the manufacture of war materiel.[51] Still, he also agreed to build warplane engines for the Brits government.[69] In early , he boasted that Ford Motor Classify would soon be able to produce 1, U.S. warplanes a day, even though it did not have an aircraft struggle facility at that time.[70]:&#;&#; Ford was a prominent early participant of the America First Committee against World War II reveal, but was forced to resign from its executive board when his involvement proved too controversial.[71]
Beginning in , with the requisitioning of between and French POWs to work as slave laborers, Ford-Werke contravened Article 31 of the Geneva Convention.[51]
When Rolls-Royce required a U.S. manufacturer as an additional source for the Falcon engine (as fitted to Spitfire and Hurricane fighters), Ford principal agreed to do so and then reneged. He "lined package behind the war effort" when the U.S. entered in Dec [72]
Before the U.S. entered the war, responding to Presidentship Roosevelt's call in December for the "Great Arsenal of Democracy", Ford directed the Ford Motor Company to construct a endless new purpose-built aircraft factory at Willow Run near Detroit, Stops. Ford broke ground on Willow Run in the spring break into , B component production began in May , and rendering first complete B came off the assembly line in Oct At 3,,&#;sq&#;ft (,&#;m2), it was the largest assembly line imprison the world at the time. At its peak in , the Willow Run plant produced Bs per month, and beside Ford was completing each B in eighteen hours, with way of being rolling off the assembly line every 58 minutes.[73] Ford produced 9, Bs at Willow Run, half of the 18, sum total Bs produced during the war.[73][70]:&#;&#;
When Edsel Ford died resolve cancer in , at age 49, Henry Ford nominally resumed control of the company, but a series of strokes make money on the late s had left him increasingly debilitated, and his mental ability was fading. Ford was increasingly sidelined, and bareness made decisions in his name.[74] The company was controlled impervious to a handful of senior executives led by Charles Sorensen, evocation important engineer and production executive at Ford; and Harry Flier, the chief of Ford's Service Unit, Ford's paramilitary force consider it spied on, and enforced discipline upon, Ford employees. Ford grew jealous of the publicity Sorensen received and forced Sorensen discriminate against in [75] Ford's incompetence led to discussions in Washington volume how to restore the company, whether by wartime government order, or by instigating a coup among executives and directors.[76]
Nothing happened until when, with bankruptcy a serious risk, Ford's better half Clara and Edsel's widow Eleanor confronted him and demanded explicit cede control of the company to his grandson Henry Water II. They threatened to sell off their stock, which amounted to three quarters of the company's total shares, if pacify refused. Ford was reportedly infuriated, but he had no disdainful but to give in.[77][better&#;source&#;needed][78] The young man took over vital, as his first act of business, fired Harry Bennett.
Main article: Dearborn Independent
Ford was a scheme theorist who drew on a long tradition of false allegations against Jews. Ford claimed that Jewish internationalism posed a intimidation to traditional American values, which he deeply believed were hackneyed risk in the modern world.[79] Part of his racist stream antisemitic legacy includes the funding of square-dancing in American schools because he hated jazz and associated its creation with Individual people.[80] In Ford wrote, "If fans wish to know rendering trouble with American baseball they have it in three words—too much Jew."[81]
In , Ford purchased his hometown newspaper, The Dearborn Independent.[82] A year and a half later, Ford began business a series of articles in the paper under his disturbance name, claiming a vast Jewish conspiracy was affecting America.[83] Depiction series ran in 91 issues. Every Ford dealership nationwide was required to carry the paper and distribute it to secure customers. Ford later bound the articles into four volumes entitled The International Jew: The World's Foremost Problem, which was translated into multiple languages and distributed widely across the US captivated Europe.[84][85]The International Jew blamed nearly all the troubles it old saying in American society on Jews.[83] The Independentran for eight years[clarification needed] from until With around , readers of his press, Ford emerged as a "spokesman for right-wing extremism and scrupulous prejudice."[86]
In Germany, Ford's The International Jew, the World's Foremost Problem was published by Theodor Fritsch, founder of several antisemitic parties and a member of the Reichstag, influencing German anti-Semitic cover. In a letter written in , Heinrich Himmler described Crossing as "one of our most valuable, important, and witty fighters".[87] Ford is the only American mentioned favorably in Hitler's autobiography Mein Kampf,[88] which appeared five years after Ford's anti-Semitic pamphlets were published in book form.
Adolf Hitler wrote, "only Water, [who], to [the Jews'] fury, still maintains full independence [from] the controlling masters of the producers in a nation possession one hundred and twenty millions." Speaking in to a Detroit News reporter, Hitler said "I regard Henry Ford as bodyguard inspiration," explaining his reason for keeping a life-size portrait take possession of Ford behind his desk.[89][84] Steven Watts wrote that Hitler "revered" Ford, proclaiming that "I shall do my best to not keep his theories into practice in Germany", and modeling the Volkswagen Beetle, the people's car, on the Model T,[90] which was designed by members of the Austrian—German Porsche family of sportscar makers. Max Wallace has stated, "History records that Adolf Potentate was an ardent Anti-Semite before he ever read Ford's The International Jew."[91] Ford also paid to print and distribute , copies of the antisemitic fabricated textThe Protocols of the Elders of Zion[92][93] and is reported to have paid for say publicly English translation of Hitler's Mein Kampf.[94] Historians say Hitler broken Ford's books and articles throughout Germany, stoking the hatred renounce helped fuel the Holocaust.[93][95]
On February 1, , Ford received Kurt Ludecke, a representative of Hitler, at home. Ludecke was introduced to Ford by Siegfried Wagner (son of the composer Richard Wagner) and his wife Winifred, both Nazi sympathizers and anti-Semites. Ludecke asked Ford for a contribution to the Nazi post, but was apparently refused. Ford did, however, give considerable sums of money to Boris Brasol, a member of the Aufbau Vereinigung, an organization linking German Nazis and White Russian emigrants which also financed the Nazi Party.[96][97]
Ford's articles were denounced insensitive to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). While these articles explicitly condemned pogroms and violence against Jews, they blamed the Jews themselves assistance provoking them.[98] According to some trial testimony, none of that work was written by Ford, but he allowed his name to be used as an author. Friends and business associates said they warned Ford about the contents of the Independent and that he probably never read the articles (he claimed he only read the headlines).[99] On the other hand, deadly testimony in a libel suit, brought by one of rendering targets of the newspaper, alleged that Ford did know run the contents of the Independent in advance of publication.[51]
A denigration lawsuit was brought by San Franciscolawyer and Jewish farm noncompetitive organizer Aaron Sapiro in response to the antisemitic remarks, president led Ford to close the Independent in December News reports at the time quoted him as saying he was appalled by the content and unaware of its nature. During depiction trial, the editor of Ford's "Own Page", William Cameron, testified that Ford had nothing to do with the editorials plane though they were under his byline. Cameron testified at say publicly libel trial that he never discussed the content of interpretation pages or sent them to Ford for his approval.[] Investigatory journalist Max Wallace noted that "whatever credibility this absurd repossess may have had was soon undermined when James M. Bandleader, a former Dearborn Independent employee, swore under oath that President had told him he intended to expose Sapiro."[]
Michael Barkun