(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Elon Musk is No Henry Ford. A Photo Diary of the Birthplace of the Model T. [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-06-27 Antisemitism Last November, Elon Musk personally and publicly expressed antisemitism by agreeing with white supremacists and attacking the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) on X, before apologizing—“most foolish”— and visiting Auschwitz this January. Since he turned Twitter into X, hate speech including antisemitism there has boomed under his ‘free speech’ policies. From 1920 to 1927, Henry Ford published an antisemitic newsletter and had it in his dealerships nationwide, until the ADL sued for libel. Through this weekly newsletter circulated to ~1 million annually, Ford infamously re-published The Protocols of the Elders of Zion with supporting commentary, breathing new life into an old hateful hoax. The Nazis were big fans, awarding Ford the Grand Cross of the German Eagle in 1938. Himmler called Ford ‘valuable’ and ‘important’. Hitler called Ford “a single great man’ in Mein Kampf and had a picture of ‘Heinrich’ in his office. Henry Ford allowed the Nazis to convert their German plants to military use before WWII, although GM may have been even more important to the Nazi war machine. Ford (or his PR staff) eventually apologized. Cars Tesla is still the most successful electric vehicle in America, but the original design work was done years before Musk’s involvement, including experimentation in the cross-country Solar Car Race beginning in 1990. Musk is directly responsible for the Cybertruck, featuring fragile ‘bulletproof’ glass, rusty ‘stainless’ steel, an ugly, questionably-aerodynamic frame, and availability reset for five years now as ‘coming next year’. Henry Ford designed and built both the car and the manufacturing process that defined the automobile for over 100 years. Out of over 100 car manufacturers in Michigan when he started, Ford is the only original firm today. Anyone care to lay odds that Tesla will be around in 100 years? Ford Model A (picnic basket not included). Piquette Avenue As part of my quest to raise awareness of the Climate Crisis by visiting all US national park units, I recently traveled to the Ford plant on Piquette Avenue in Detroit, where Henry Ford designed and built the Models B, C, F, K, N, R, S and T from 1904 to 1910. He kept his office on the first floor where he inspected every new part and built a secret lab on the second floor to design the Model T. After the Model T took off, Ford moved production to Highland Park where he built the world’s first continuously moving automated assembly line. Fortunately, the Piquette Plant was never significantly remodeled, and enthusiasts have now turned it into what I believe is the best museum in Detroit’s MotorCities National Heritage Area. Piquette has each model leading up to and including Ford’s dream car, the Model T, and my tour was led by a long time Ford autoworker who told the whole story well. Ford Model B, bigger & better. Ford Model C, “tonneau” (backseat) Background Having grown up on a large farm—and worked on engines for Westinghouse and then for Edison—Henry Ford wanted to build a reliable, cheap vehicle that would help rural Americans. His first ‘horseless carriage’ was an electric ‘quadricycle’ in 1896. He raced early vehicles competitively and was involved in the startup that became Cadillac. In 1903 Ford took his design to his own startup and built the low-cost, first Model A in a rented space. Ford was friends with or worked with many of the famed names of the auto industry, or maybe it’s more accurate to say they worked with him. The Dodge brothers built his engines. Spyder Huff built the legendary flywheel magneto, which got and kept the engine running. Ford’s partners known as EMF went on to Studebaker, which later built cars at Piquette. Ford was good friends with Harvey Firestone of tire fame and Thomas Edison. On ethanol, Ford cooperated with Charles Kettering, who founded AC Delco, even though Ford initially resisted the self-starter. Why Not Steampunk? But I’m getting the story mixed up. Maybe I should start with the starter. In the beginning, it was unclear whether horseless carriages would be powered by steam, gasoline or electricity. Coal was commonplace, but steam engines sometimes exploded. Gasoline was also ubiquitous, as both a fuel and a solvent found in rural hardware stores, but gas engines were difficult to start. Electric engines were elegantly simple, and Ford built several for wealthy women and their kids. Edison loved his electric car. But batteries then held little power, and only the rich could afford high powered electric charging stations. Knowing that farmers had easy access to gasoline across the country, Ford focused on gas engines, and customers started their cars with hand cranks attached to the flywheel. This made Ford’s cars cheap, safe and reliable. (Well, I say safe, but a friend of the Cadillac CEO died in a freak hand crank accident, so Cadillac replaced the hand crank with the self-starter.) Before the Model T, no type of fuel had a majority of the market. After the Model T, cars ran on gas. Ford Model F, a bit fancier. Ford Model K, the gentleman’s giant. Ford Model N, with updated drive shaft. Many Models Long before the Japanese perfected the art of refining products through many small upgrades, Henry Ford went through 1/3 of the alphabet perfecting his car. The Model B was more powerful. The Model C was sold to country doctors who needed to make house calls. The Model F was larger and more luxurious. The K was a high-status gentleman’s car. The N had a more direct drive shaft system. The R had better suspension and bigger wheels. And the Model S was both updated and affordable. Ford Model R (not on display when I visited). Ford Model S, updated & affordable. Prior to automobiles, traffic patterns were already established. In Britain and her loyal colonies, horses & carriages rode on the left. While in the US and continental Europe, carriages ran on the right. Steering wheels were originally placed on the right, but Mrs Ford complained. As a passenger, she preferred to step onto the sidewalk directly to avoid dirtying her hems in horse manure. So, that’s why US steering wheels are now on the left. You may notice that ‘Elizabeth’ above is red, even though Ford famously said “any color, so long as it’s black”. The slowest part of the manufacturing process was painting, and black paint dried quicker. So Ford made black the factory standard. But most of the cars on display at Piquette are in their original colors including forest green. Even the Model T came in many different versions, including fire truck, taxicab and florist delivery truck, plus accessory kits like farm plows, snow skis, truck beds, detachable roofs, and extra seats for kids. In 1910, Ford’s Model T was sold in six different versions: $825 Roadster, $850 Tourabout, $850 5-Passenger Touring, $1000 Coupe, $1000 Town, and $1,100 Landaulet (taxi). 17 years later, Ford reintroduced the Model A as an update to the Model T (confusing poor amateur historians like me). Ford Model T, Custom Speedster, 1926 Cheaper than a Horse and Carriage While you could buy a horse & carriage for $500, the operating costs were higher. Tires were cheaper than horseshoes, and gasoline was cheaper than keeping the horse fed. Break even was only two years, and the Model T was built to last for years. Why Was the Model T the Breakthrough? The limiting engineering factor was weight. The more features that Ford wanted to have, the heavier the vehicle, affecting cost to build, structural requirements, range and all the rest. Around 1905, Ford found French-made vanadium steel, and started planning his dream car. Using the special alloy, he was able to reduce the weight of his car to about ½ of his competition. The Model T was the first to use the new, strong, lightweight steel. Ford Model T, fire truck edition. After Ford completed building the prototype in secret, his friend Firestone drove him around the neighborhood. Then Henry packed it up and drove to the Upper Peninsula (around through Wisconsin) on a fishing trip. (Ford loved camping and would later travel on many epic roadtrips with his friends, known as the four vagabonds: Ford, Edison, Firestone and Burroughs, an influential naturalist.) When Ford returned from his vacation/test drive, he ordered everyone to start production of the Model T. Before the Cybertruck or Tesla Semi was the Model T truck. Key Learning Perhaps the most important lesson to take away from the early history of the automobile is that gasoline cars were neither inevitable nor superior. Successful businesses don’t always use the best technology. The self-starter was better than the hand crank, but the Model T used the old tech. Which technology becomes most common is sometimes completely arbitrary. Simply because we all grew up with one basic type of car, doesn’t mean that’s how it began or how cars must forever be. If not for Mrs Ford’s complaint, we might all have been used to steering wheels on the right. If electricity had evolved a bit earlier, then we might all have grown up with electric cars. Technology is often adopted arbitrarily and changes daily, so why must we continue using the same old technologies, simply because we grew up with them? The Climate Crisis demands that we switch to electric vehicles to wean ourselves off fossil fuels. The rest of the world still largely follows our lead as far as which products and technologies become dominant, so the sooner we switch, the sooner the world switches. Even if the internal combustion engine were not noisier, dirtier, costlier, higher maintenance, less efficient and more dangerous, we would still have an obligation to the future livability of our planet to switch to electric now. Ford Model T, accessorized for winter. The Future of Electric Vehicles Traditional car companies have resisted electric cars for over a century. I recently drove a Ford Mach E, but it’s not clear that Ford is really committed to electric vehicles: the new car lacks fast charging. Today’s consumers, filled with misinformation, are also resistant, threatening our path to a cleaner, cooler world. Even on this site, many won’t buy fully electric vehicles, especially those produced by an unpopular billionaire @$$#ole. Henry Ford and GM supported the Nazis, but I bet many folks here grew up driving Ford and GM cars, without giving his antisemitism a thought. I’m not telling folks to hold their noses and buy Teslas, but please consider switching to another American made electric car. If our electric car industry fails, then the world’s next best hope may be China. Must I start rooting for authoritarian China and their workers over Americans, because I want life on Earth to continue? Joe Biden has taken some important steps to drag our recalcitrant industry into a green future, and I have no doubt that traditional car companies fully expect billions in ‘taxpayer assistance’ to overcome their conservative thinking. Politically, we can and must mandate a low-carbon future, but, first, individually, we can and must switch to a low-carbon present. Consumers must lead the exodus from fossil fuels to electric, and that requires education, forward-thinking and action. Please help, and thank you for reading. 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