Biography - FH - Henry Ford - Part 1 of 2 - Automotive Pioneer

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PEOPLE IN AMERICA a program in Special English on the VOICE of America.
Every week at this time, we tell the story of a person was important in the history of the United States. Today Steve Ember and Frank Oliver begin the story of industrialist Henry Ford.
Many people believe Henry Ford invented the automobile. But Henry Ford did not start to build his first car until eighteen ninety-six. That was eleven years after two Germans -- Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz -- developed the first gasoline-powered automobile.
Many people believe Henry Ford invented the factory system that moved a car's parts to the worker, instead of making the worker move to the parts. That is not true, either. Many manufacturers used this system before Ford.
What Henry Ford did was to use other people's ideas and make them better.
Others made cars. Henry Ford made better cars. And he sold them for less money. Others built car factories. Henry Ford built the biggest factory of its time. And he made the whole factory a moving production line.
Henry Ford was born on a farm in the state of Michigan on July thirtieth, eighteen sixty-three. The farm was near the city of Detroit. After three years in Detroit, Henry returned to his family farm. He remained on the farm until he was thirty years old. But he was not a real farmer. He was a machine man. A nearby farmer, for example, had bought a small steam engine to be used in farming. The machine did not work correctly. Henry agreed to try to fix it. At the end of just one day, Henry knew everything about the machine. And he made it work again.Henry remembered that time as the happiest in his life. He "I was paid three dollars a day, and had eighty-three days of steady work. I have never been better satisfied with myself. " Another thing that made those days happy was meeting a young woman. Her name was Clara Jane Bryant. Years later Henry "I knew in half an hour she was the one for me. " They were married in eighteen eighty-eight, on Clara's twenty-second birthday. In eighteen ninety-one, Henry visited Detroit. There he saw a machine called the "silent otto. " It was a device powered by gasoline. It had been developed by a German, Nikolaus August Otto. He was one of the men who had worked with Gottlieb Daimler, who developed the first gasoline-powered automobile.
He returned home to Clara with an idea to build such a machine In eighteen ninety-nine, Henry resigned from the power company to work on his automobile. He won the support of a small group of rich men who formed the Detroit automobile company. By the start of nineteen-oh-one, however, the company had failed.
Another man might have decided that the automobile business was not the best business for him. He might have stopped. Henry Ford was just getting started.
In the early days of the automobile, almost every car-maker raced his cars. It was the best way of gaining public notice. Henry Ford decided to build a racing car.
Ford's most famous race was his first. It also was the last race in which he drove the car himself.
The race was in nineteen-oh-one, at a field near Detroit. All of the most famous cars had entered. And all withdrew, except two. The Winton. And Ford's. The Winton was famous for its speed. Most people thought the race was over before it began.
The Winton took an early lead. But halfway through the race, it began to lose power. Ford started to gain. And near the end of the race, he took the lead. Ford won the race and defeated the champion. His name appeared in newspapers. His fame began to spread.
Henry continued to build racing cars. His most famous cars of the time were the "Arrow" and the "Nine Ninety-Nine. " Both won races. And they helped make the name Henry Ford more famous.
Henry used what he learned from racing to develop a better engine.At the start of nineteen-oh-five, the Ford Motor Company was producing twenty-five cars each day. It employed three hundred men. The company produced several kinds of cars. First there was the "Model A. " Then there were the "Model B," "Model C" and "Model F. " They were just a little different from the "Model A" one of Ford's most famous cars.
Ford's "Model K" car was for wealthy buyers.
The story shows the way Henry's mind worked. When he thought he was correct, he was willing to invest his efforts and his money. Earlier, he had walked away from the business of making cars when he could not control the business. Now he had the money to buy the stock of those who disagreed with him.
In nineteen-oh-seven, Henry Ford And it will be built with the simplest plans that modern engineering can produce. It will be so low in price that no man making good money will be unable to own one. " That was what Henry Ford wanted. To reach his goal, his life took many interesting turns. That will be our story next week.
This is a VOA product and is in the public domain