In the year 1879, there was a sixteen year old boy living in the
country near Detroit, Michigan. He was not fond of farm work but
nevertheless he did his share in helping his father, who was a thrifty
farmer. Day after day, this boy trudged back and forth two and
one-half miles each way to the school house. In his spare hours when
he was not farming, he had fitted up a work shop for his own use.
There was a vise, a bow-string driven lathe and a rudely built forge.
He had made these tools himself and was very proud of them. When he
was only a small boy, he had made his first tool by taking one of his
grandmother's knitting needles, heating it red hot and plunging it
into a bar of soap as he bent it into shape. Then he added a wooden
handle that he had whittled and the tool was done.
As soon as he had something with which to work, he began to take to
pieces all manner of things just for the fun of putting them together
again. He says: "I must have taken apart and put together more than a
thousand clocks and watches." He thought it would be a fine thing to
be able to make many good watches, and to make them all alike. He
never realized this dream, but in later life he did make a good
automobile, he made many of them, and he made them all alike.
[Illustration: HENRY FORD
In His First Motor Car]
His first step towards this great business undertaking happened before
he was seventeen years of age, when he left his father's farm and went
to Detroit to work as a mechanic in a shop. He never returned to the
farm, although for a time he lived on some land his father had given
to him, and conducted a lumber business. All the time he was
experimenting, and he wanted to make something that would go. By the
time he was twenty-one years of age, he had built a farm locomotive
mounted on cast-iron wheels taken from a mowing machine. It was not
designed for any particular use, but was to serve as a general farm
tractor, and he had great sport running it up and down the meadow
while the cows fled in terror.
From that time his chief interest was in building wagons to be run by
motors. His health was always good, he worked unceasingly, and slept
just as little as possible, and at last, in 1893, he made what people
called then, a wagon driven by gas; today we call it an automobile. It
ran but was not a great success, and the public made fun of the
inventor. This wagon driven by gas was the first Ford automobile and
the man who invented it was Henry Ford. He had married and lived in a
little house in Bagley Street, Detroit, Michigan. He was employed by
the Edison Company, but he had a workshop of his own in his barn.
There he built his first motor car. For material he used nothing but
junk, as he had no money with which to buy costly materials for
experiments.
Henry Ford does not know the word discouragement, so after his first
failure he built another car and in 1898 placed it on the road. It
was better than the first one, but there were still difficulties to be
overcome. People laughed more than ever, and Detroit thought him
mildly insane on the subject of "little buggies driven by gas," as the
newspapers called them. Then one day, when no one was paying any
especial attention to him, Henry Ford made a car that would run on
level ground, would run up and down hill, and go backward and forward.
His problem was solved, and he began to make automobiles. Today he is
the head of the Ford Motor Company which has its largest factory in
Highland Park, a suburb of Detroit, Michigan, not more than fifteen
miles from his birthplace.
At the Highland Park plant, one thousand times a day a newborn car
pushes open a door by itself and goes out into the world. At once
these cars are loaded on trains and sent away, for the plant has no
storage and there are always more orders than can be filled. The Ford
cars are used by many persons, they are all made alike and they are
made in large numbers. Henry Ford's old dream about making watches has
come true, only he makes automobiles instead of timepieces.
In his great factory the most improved machinery is used, and the
business is run on a profit-sharing plan, which means that the daily
pay of the men in his employ increases as the profit of the plant
increases. A just amount is paid to each workman and Mr. Ford says:
"If a man can make himself of any use at all, put him on, give him
his chance and if he tries to do the right thing, we can find a living
for him any way." Eight hours is the length of the working day with
extra pay for overtime work. The wages in the Ford factories have
always been above what is generally paid so there are always many
persons who want to work there.
However, Henry Ford has two other great interests besides automobiles.
They are boys and birds. His only child is a bright and earnest boy
but Mr. Ford does not forget other boys in doing for his own. There
are always a dozen or more boys that he is training and helping to
prepare for life, thus giving to the world strong, helpful citizens.
As for birds, he has built two hundred bird houses in the grounds of
his home. They are heated with electricity in winter so as to keep the
birds' drinking water from freezing, and by a clever arrangement of
tubes, food can be sent electrically to each little house. Recently
Mr. Ford brought from England three hundred and eighty song birds not
native to the United States. They settled down and built nests in his
trees and shrubbery. He hopes to have them increase and add to the
beauty of our natural life.
His interest in birds and out of door life has been strengthened by
his long friendship with John Burroughs, the naturalist, and the two
have had many tramps and camping trips together. These excursions are
Mr. Ford's vacations and he likes to take them with this great nature
lover or with his other good friend, Thomas A. Edison, with whom he is
most congenial.
Having no bad habits, perfect health, never being tired, willing to
listen to others, able to decide quickly, and world-wide in his
interests, Henry Ford is one of the twentieth century's greatest
public-spirited business men. No better illustration can be found than
the fact that although Mr. Ford did not believe in war and was a man
of peace, yet when the United States entered the World War, he
hastened to Washington, offered his great factory to the government to
make war supplies, and began running night and day to furnish our
country with war-time necessities. If some one wished to choose for
him a coat of arms they should select, "A file and hammer crossed, a
warm, glowing heart placed above them," while the words,
"I love,
I build,
I give."
should be written underneath. This should be sufficient to describe
the nature of the kindly, frank and unassuming man, who, with a large
amount of money coming in each month, cares nothing for it as money
but wishes to use it to promote the good will of the world.