His wages barely paid for living expenses and for tools and materials for his tinkering. But his wife was cooperative and did not complain but rather, encouraged him. In November 1983, a son was born to Henry and Clara, they named him Edsel.
A few weeks later, just before Christmas, Henry had completed his engine. A successful testing of the engine excited Henry and he decided to build one with two cylinders. Slightly over two and a half years later, Henry had built his first horseless carriage with four bicycle wheels and seat. His contraption would not fit out of the workshop so he simply knocked out a portion of the wall. The car tested successfully, but was very impractical as someone on a bicycle had to ride ahead to warn the people with horses as the car startled them. Henry quit his very promising job at the Edison Illuminating Company on August 15, 1989.
He was to head the new Detroit Automobile Company. Instead of producing any cars though, Henry spent the money on improving his design. The experimental models that he produced cost a great deal of money and a little more than a year later, the Detroit Automobile Company had failed. To gain supporters, Henry built a racing car.
If he could win a race, he could get backers and form his own company. Henry did successfully win a race in October, 1901 and acquiring backers became no longer a problem. On November, 1901, the Henry Ford Company was formed. This company fared no better than the previous. Ford still wanted to build a low-priced car that ordinary people could afford to buy and drive.
Ford would not sacrifice his standards for the profit. (Much unlike his portrayal in Brave New World). Finally in June, 1903, a third company, the Ford Motor Company, was incorporated. Ford continued working on his “cheap” design. It was ready shortly after the new company’s formation and orders came in faster than they could be filled. Ford, Charles Sorensen and a small group of dedicated engineers began working on a “universal car.
” By October, 1908, the Model-T had been constructed. Again orders began coming in faster than they could be filled. This presented Ford with his next challenge, to increase the production rate of the automobiles. Sorensen and Ford finally came up with the assembly line idea.
Rather than having the men go to the work, the work would come to the man, brought along on pulleys and chains overhead. One problem bothered Ford increasingly, however. Assembly- line work was monotonous and uninteresting. The Ford factory had a great turnover of employees, and too much time was wasted in training new men.
The men were currently only being paid the minimum wage of $2 a day. Ford decided (much to his colleagues’ displeasure and protest) that the men would be paid $5 and that the work day would be shortened to that of an eight-hour day. Some people praised him as a great humanitarian. Others denounced Ford as a madman, a crackpot, and a villain. One may have considered Ford unjust in making his men work on the assembly line, this is not so. Ford had more than doubled the wages of his men, shortened their work day, and thereby tried to give the employees a share of the profits.
Ford eventually resigned as president of his company and gave control to Edsel. Conflicts rose between Edsel and Henry. All his life, Ford had been in charge, calling the shots. Now, even though Edsel was President inname, none of the decisions went without Henry’s approval. Edsel had wanted to produce a new model for several years, and finally Henry Sales soared. This was last real success that Henry Ford saw in his company.
The great depression was coming, sales dropped, and labour unions formed. Originally Ford had “factory police” to monitor the men and keep away people related to union, but on June 18, 1941, the men went on strike and Henry was handed a union contract. It spelled out the terms on which his men would work, and even set the speed of the assembly line. Ford refused to sign. Only after his wife threatened to leave him, did Henry sign. He did not just sign, he gave them better terms.
Henry felt a need to dictate. He had always been in control, and this was time was no exception. War broke out in December, 1941. Ford’s factories were converted to plants that constructed war machines. Even in this time, Ford kept his love for nature and the old times.
Henry constructed a museum. He even had his father’s old farmhouse rebuilt. It was in 1942 that his son Edsel died of cancer. The shock nearly killed old Henry, but ratherthan give up his hold on the Ford Motor Company, he made himself President once more.
He was old now, and in 1945 he relinquished all responsibility to Edsel’s son, Harry II. The Ford Company took on new life under young Henry, but Ford was not around to see it. In 1947 Henry Ford fell ill and took to his bed. On April 27, alone with his wife and one servant, Henry died at age eighty-four. After his death, a foundation was formed to administer his vastfortune.
The foundation gave substantial support to various projects in the arts, in medicine and in other important areas of American life. Ford was a great man who revolutionized our world. Ford put the world on wheels, and in so doing, he made it a smaller world.
