|  Childhood
Henry Ford, born July 30, 1863, was the first of William and Mary
Ford's six children. He grew up on a prosperous family farm in what
is today Dearborn, Michigan. Henry enjoyed a childhood typical of
the rural nineteenth century, spending days in a one-room school and
doing farm chores. At an early age, he showed an interest in mechanical
things and a dislike for farm work.
In 1879, sixteen-year-old Ford left home for the nearby city of Detroit
to work as an apprentice machinist, although he did occasionally return
to help on the farm. He remained an apprentice for three years and
then returned to Dearborn. During the next few years, Henry divided
his time between operating or repairing steam engines, finding occasional
work in a Detroit factory, and over-hauling his father's farm implements,
as well as lending a reluctant hand with other farm work. Upon his
marriage to Clara Bryant in 1888, Henry supported himself and his
wife by running a sawmill.
 The Engineer
In
1891, Ford became an engineer with the Edison Illuminating Company in
Detroit. This event signified a conscious decision on Ford's part to
dedicate his life to industrial pursuits. His promotion to Chief Engineer
in 1893 gave him enough time and money to devote attention to his personal
experiments on internal combustion engines.
These experiments culminated in 1896 with the completion of his own
self-propelled vehicle-the Quadricycle. The Quadricycle had four wire
wheels that looked like heavy bicycle wheels, was steered with a tiller
like a boat, and had only two forward speeds with no reverse. Although
Ford was not the first to build a self-propelled vehicle with a gasoline
engine, he was, however, one of several automotive pioneers who helped
this country become a nation of motorists.
Ford Motor Company
After two unsuccessful attempts to establish a company to manufacture
automobiles, the Ford Motor Company was incorporated in 1903 with Henry
Ford as vice-president and chief engineer. The infant company produced
only a few cars a day at the Ford factory on Mack Avenue in Detroit.
Groups of two or three men worked on each car from components made to
order by other companies.
Henry Ford realized his dream of producing an automoautomobile that
was reasonably priced, reliable, and efficient with the introduction
of the Model T in 1908. This vehicle initiated a new era in personal
transportation. It was easy to operate, maintain, and handle on rough
roads, immediately becoming a huge success.
By 1918, half of all cars in America were Model Ts. To meet the growing
demand for the Model T, the company opened a large factory at Highland
Park, Michigan, in 1910. Here, Henry Ford combined precision manufacturing,
standardized and interchangeable parts, a division of labor, and, in
1913, a continuous moving assembly line. Workers remained in place,
adding one component to each automobile as it moved past them on the
line. Delivery of parts by conveyor belt to the workers was carefully
timed to keep the assembly line moving smoothly and efficiently. The
introduction of the moving assembly line revolutionized automobile production
by significantly reducing assembly time per vehicle, thus lowering costs.
Ford's production of Model Ts made his company the largest automobile
manufacturer in the world.
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