Additional information
by Charles River (Author)
*Includes pictures.
*Includes Ford's quotes about his own life and career.
*Discusses the controversies surrounding Ford and Nazi Germany.
*Includes a bibliography for further reading.
"A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business." - Henry Ford
"I don't know much about history, and I wouldn't give a nickel for all the history in the world. It means nothing to me. History is more or less bunk. It's tradition. We don't want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker's damn is the history we make today." - Henry Ford in a 1916 newspaper interview.
A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history's most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees? In Charles River Editors' American Legends series, readers can get caught up to speed on the lives of America's most important men and women in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known.
Few Americans have a reputation and legacy anything like Henry Ford's, the man whose name is still associated with one of the world's most famous car companies. Ford is unquestionably one of his country's most famous industrialists, and his use of an assembly line to mass produce automobiles was not only innovative but also made it possible for Americans to own cars en masse. To this day, Ford Motor Company's Model T is a household name more than a century after they were manufactured, not only because they were famous cars but because they represented affordable purchases that revolutionized the way people traveled across the country. Cars would never be a luxury item only for the wealthy again.
Although Ford's use of an assembly line meant human labor was not as necessary as it would otherwise be, he became known for advocating on behalf of labor rights, including offering an unprecedented $5 work day (the equivalent of $120 today), which doubled how much his workers were previously making and helped ensure his company would be both popular and a destination for workers. Ford helped Detroit become the Motor Capital, and he was progressive when it came to hiring minorities and women. In the process, Ford, who was born into a farming family of modest means, also enriched himself beyond his wildest imaginations, with Forbes magazine recently estimating that his net worth in today's dollars was nearly $190 billion.
However, while Ford may arguably be America's most famous businessman, part of that is due to his virulent anti-Semitism and his association with Nazi Germany in the 1930s and the lead up to World War II. He invested in a weekly publication that became notorious for its screeds, and Ford was the only American praised in Hitler's Mein Kampf because of his antagonism towards Jews. Hitler went so far as to call Ford an "inspiration". On his 75th birthday, Ford was awarded the Grand Cross of the German Eagle, which was the highest honor a non-German could receive from Nazi Germany, but one acquaintance later claimed that Ford was disgusted when he saw footage of Nazi concentration camps and what had happened to Jews across Europe.
American Legends: The Life of Henry Ford profiles the life and career of one of America's most famous and infamous industrialists. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about Henry Ford like never before, in no time at all.
