Henry Ford: Difference between revisions

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{{short description|American industrialist and businessman}}

Ford's most successful aircraft was the [[Ford Trimotor|Ford 4AT Trimotor]], often called the "Tin Goose" because of its corrugated metal construction. It used a new alloy called [[Alclad]] that combined the corrosion resistance of aluminum with the strength of [[duralumin]]. The plane was similar to [[Fokker]]'s V.VII-3m, and some say {{Who|date=June 2021}}that Ford's engineers surreptitiously measured the Fokker plane and then copied it. The Trimotor first flew on June 11, 1926, and was the first successful U.S. passenger airliner, accommodating about 12 passengers in a rather uncomfortable fashion. Several variants were also used by the [[U.S. Army]]. The [[Smithsonian Institution]] has honored Ford for changing the aviation industry. 199 Trimotors were built before it was discontinued in 1933, when the Ford Airplane Division shut down because of poor sales during the [[Great Depression]].

 

 

====World War I era====

{{Further|Peace Ship|1918 United States Senate election in Michigan}}

 

In 1918, with the war on and the [[League of Nations]] a growing issue in global politics, President [[Woodrow Wilson]], a Democrat, encouraged Ford to run for a Michigan seat in the U.S. Senate. Wilson believed that Ford could tip the scales in Congress in favor of Wilson's proposed [[League of Nations|League]]. "You are the only man in Michigan who can be elected and help bring about the peace you so desire," the president wrote Ford. Ford wrote back: "If they want to elect me let them do so, but I won't make a penny's investment." Ford did run, however, and came within 7,000 votes of winning, out of more than 400,000 cast statewide.<ref>Banham, Russ. (2002) ''The Ford Century.'' Tehabi Books. {{ISBN|1-887656-88-X}}, p. 44.</ref> He was defeated in a close election by the Republican candidate, [[Truman Newberry]], a former [[United States Secretary of the Navy]]. Ford remained a staunch Wilsonian and supporter of the League. When Wilson made a major speaking tour in the summer of 1919 to promote the League, Ford helped fund the attendant publicity.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/peoplestycoonhen00watt |title=''The People's Tycoon'' |last=Watts |publisher=A.A. Knopf |year=2005 |page=[https://archive.org/details/peoplestycoonhen00watt/page/378 378] |isbn=9780375407352 |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>John Milton Cooper Jr, ''Woodrow Wilson: A Biography'' (2009) p. 521</ref>

====Coming of World War II and Ford's mental collapse====

Ford had opposed the United States' entry into World War II<ref name="Wallace" /><ref>Baldwin, Neil (2001). ''Henry Ford and the Jews: The Mass Production of Hate''. New York: Public Affairs.</ref> and continued to believe that international business could generate the prosperity that would head off wars. Ford "insisted that war was the product of greedy financiers who sought profit in human destruction". In 1939, he went so far as to claim that the torpedoing of U.S. merchant ships by German submarines was the result of conspiratorial activities undertaken by financier war-makers.<ref>Stephen Watts, ''The People's Tycoon'' (2005) p. 505</ref> The financiers to whom he was referring was Ford's code for Jews; he had also accused Jews of fomenting the First World War.<ref name="Wallace" /><ref>Baldwin</ref> In the run-up to World War II and when the war erupted in 1939, he reported that he did not want to trade with belligerents. Like many other businessmen of the Great Depression era, he never liked or entirely trusted the Franklin Roosevelt Administration, and thought Roosevelt was inching the U.S. closer to war. Ford continued to do business with [[Nazi Germany]], including the manufacture of war [[materiel]].<ref name="Wallace" /> However, he also agreed to build warplane engines for the British government.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://michiganhistory.leadr.msu.edu/wwii-and-ford-motor-company/ |title=WWII and Ford Motor Company – Michigan History}}</ref> In early 1940, he boasted that Ford Motor Company would soon be able to produce 1,000 U.S. warplanes a day, even though it did not have an aircraft production facility at that time.<ref name="LegendOfHenryFord">{{cite book | last=Sward | first=Keith | title=The Legend of Henry Ford | publisher=Rinehart & Company Inc. | year=1948 | url=https://archive.org/details/unset0000unse_d3s5 | access-date=April 26, 2020}}</ref>{{rp|430}}

 

When [[Rolls-Royce Limited|Rolls-Royce]] sought a U.S. manufacturer as an additional source for the [[Rolls-Royce Merlin|Merlin]] engine (as fitted to [[Supermarine Spitfire|Spitfire]] and [[Hawker Hurricane|Hurricane]] fighters), Ford first agreed to do so and then [[Rolls-Royce Merlin#Packard V-1650|reneged]]. He "lined up behind the war effort" when the U.S. entered in December 1941.<ref>Watts, ''The People's Tycoon'' (2005) p. 508</ref> His support of the American war effort, however, was problematic.

 

Before the U.S. entered the war, responding to President Roosevelt's call in December 1940 for the "Great Arsenal of Democracy", Ford directed the [[Ford Motor Company]] to construct a vast new purpose-built aircraft factory at [[Willow Run]] near Detroit, Michigan. Ford broke ground on Willow Run in the spring of 1941, B-24 component production began in May 1942, and the first complete [[Consolidated B-24 Liberator|B-24]] came off the line in October 1942. At {{convert|3,500,000|ft2|m2|abbr=on}}, it was the largest assembly line in the world at the time. At its peak in 1944, the Willow Run plant produced 650 B-24s per month, and by 1945 Ford was completing each B-24 in eighteen hours, with one rolling off the assembly line every 58 minutes.<ref name="Willowrun">Nolan, Jenny. [https://web.archive.org/web/20180625103810/http://blogs.detroitnews.com/history/1997/01/27/willow-run-and-the-arsenal-of-democracy/ "Michigan History: Willow Run and the Arsenal of Democracy."] ''The Detroit News,'' January 28, 1997. Retrieved: August 7, 2010.</ref> Ford produced 9,000 B-24s at Willow Run, half of the 18,000 total B-24s produced during the war.<ref name="Willowrun" /><ref name="LegendOfHenryFord" />{{rp|430}}