FORD: The Man, The Times, The Company 2 Vols.

by Allan Nevins ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1953

As in his recent Study in Power (report in March 1, 1953 bulletin), in which John D. Rockefeller afforded a key to the oil industry, Dr. Nevins brings to his readers through another pioneer, Henry Ford, the story of the invention of the automobile and the industrial revolution it produced. The subtitle reads along in chronology of presentation rather than in point of stress: the story of modern transportation, of the men who made both vehicle and production a reality, of the far-reaching effects of all this action is the story of many men besides Ford. But as the man who knew the isolation of a farm boyhood, whose keenness with mechanics drew him from farm to factory, who was first to produce a car for the millions and who used mass production methods to accomplish this feat, who introduced the five dollar day and a sociological department in his plant -- Ford rises as a pioneer and innovator among the other inventors and producers of the automobile. His story as told here is in the main occupational, leading away from the earlier family descriptions and glimpses of a devoted marriage into the embrace of industry and the company. In scrupulous detail Mr. Nevins describes the advent of the automobile as men in Europe and America worked over it; the story of the Selden patent and the fight Ford made against it to the benefit of the entire industry; the contributions of other industrialists such as Leland and of the men on Ford's own staff. He closes his second volume at a peak in the Ford industrial career following the years of great accomplishment, 1903-1915, only hinting at the bitterer days ahead as Ford hardened and tried his hunches in fields beyond his circle of wizardry... A telling chapter in the history of American industrialism.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1953

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Scribner

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1953

Categories: NONFICTION