American Axis, The CHAPTER 1 CHRONICLER OF THE NEGLECTED TRUTH T he process that brought Henry Ford''s portrait to a prominent position behind Hitler''s desk began during the summer of 1919, when Ford made the first public sortie in a hate-filled but distinctively American campaign that was to dominate his attention for the next eight years. In July, he announced to the New York World that "International financiers are behind all war . they are what is called the international Jew: German Jews, French Jews, English Jews, American Jews . the Jew is a threat."1 From any other figure, the interview might have been dismissed as the ravings of a crackpot. But these words were uttered by the man who was arguably America''s most respected and celebrated figure--a man whose achievements had already permanently altered the nation''s economic and industrial landscape. This was the first signal that he was about to have a profound impact on America''s social character as well. By 1919, Henry Ford had already secured his place as history''s most important automobile pioneer.
He had not invented the car or the assembly line, as many believed, but he had revolutionized both, radically changing the country''s transportation habits with the introduction of the Model T--the nation''s first affordable car. After proclaiming in 1908 that he would "build a motorcar for the great multitude," Ford had by 1913 turned out more than a quarter million units of the car Americans affectionately referred to as the "Tin Lizzie." According to economist Fred Thompson, Ford''s car was the chief instrument of one of history''s greatest changes in the lives of the common people. Farmers were no longer isolated on remotefarms. The horse disappeared so rapidly that the transfer of acreage from hay to other crops caused an agricultural revolution. The automobile became the main prop of the American economy.2 Within a short period, Henry Ford had joined the likes of Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Mellon as one of the country''s industrial giants. Nonetheless, in 1913, five years after he first introduced the Model T, neither Who''s Who nor the New York Times index contained a single reference to Ford or his company.
3 His next innovation, however, was destined forever to put an end to this anonymity. At the beginning of 1914, the Ford Motor Company found itself in trouble. Two factors in particular were worrying the board of directors. Because of low wages and poor working conditions, it had become increasingly difficult to retain employees. Turnover approached 380 percent, and at one point it was necessary to hire nearly one thousand workers to keep one hundred on the payroll. More worrisome still was a campaign begun the year before by the nation''s largest industrial union, the IWW, targeting Ford for unionization and encouraging the workers to stage a slowdown. Union pamphlets featuring such ditties as "The hours are long, the pay is small, so take your time and buck ''em all," had shareholders terrified for their profits.4 Ford''s assembly line had revolutionized production but it was also being blamed for the increasing dehumanization of workers.
5 A letter to Ford from the wife of one of his assembly-line workers provides a touchingly humble indictment of the conditions in his factory at the time: My Dear Mr. Ford--Please pardon the means I am taking of asking you for humanity''s sake to investigate and to pardon my seeming rudeness but Mr. Ford I am the wife of one of the final assemblers in your institution and neither one of us want to be agitators and thus do not want to say anything to make anyone else more aggrivated but Mr. Ford you do not know the conditions in your factory we are all sure or you would not allow it. Are you aware that a man cannot "buck nature" when he has to go to the toilet and yet he is not allowed to go at his work. He has to go before he gets there or after work. The chain system you have is a slave driver! My God! Mr. Ford.
My husband has come home and thrown himself down and won''t eat his supper--so done out. Can''t it be remedied?6 Her letter reflects nothing more than the norm in American industry at the beginning of the twentieth century. Workers were considered little betterthan beasts of burden; theirs was a grind of tedious and back-breaking labor from which any consideration for the employee''s welfare was absent. The average worker toiled nine hours a day for a salary that barely approached subsistence levels. Profits were based on wages as low as a worker would take and pricing as high as the market would bear. Industrialists were regularly pilloried in the press as robber barons and caricatured in the nation''s magazines as inhuman slave drivers. A decade earlier, President Teddy Roosevelt was cheered when he declared war on the industrial trusts he said were ruining the country. That was about to change.
Whether motivated by a genuine concern for the welfare of his workers or a fear of unionization, Ford convened a meeting of his board of directors on Tuesday, January 5, 1914, to announce the revolutionary policy that would alter permanently the worker-employer relationship. Henceforth, he announced to the stunned silence of his colleagues, the minimum wage for Ford workers would be more than doubled from $2.34 a day to $5.00, and the working day would be cut from nine to eight hours.7 An elaborate system of profit-sharing would be introduced. "Our workers are not sharing in our good fortune," declared Ford. "There are thousands out there in the shop who are not living as they should."8 The effect was electrifying, signaling nothing less than a new era in American industry.
The next morning, every newspaper in the land announced the new policy with blaring headlines. "It is the most generous stroke of policy between a captain of industry and worker that the country has ever seen," wrote the Michigan Manufacturer and Financial Record. 9 According to the New York Globe, Ford''s new wage scheme had "all the advantages and none of the disadvantages of socialism." Overnight, Ford was hailed as a national hero. One newspaper called him "the new Messiah." The only negative note was sounded by his fellow industrialists, who appeared to regard Ford as a traitor to his class, worried that their own workers would expect similar treatment. In an editorial, the Wall Street Journal --voice of American Big Business--called the wage blatantly immoral, an "economic crime."10 Treating workers humanely would set a dangerous precedent that might threaten the entire capitalist system, the paper warned.
To his detractors, Ford explained that the new policy was merely sound business practice, not a humanitarian gesture, and would result in increased productivity and higher profits. But grateful American workers saw humanity in it and sent thousands of letters and telegrams thanking him for his generosity. That week, police had to be summoned to quell a riot when more than 12,000 men lined up at the gates of the Ford plant in hope of a job. Newspaper reporters descended on the company''s Dearborn, Michigan, headquarters to record the new hero''s every utterance. Ford was gladto oblige them. His homilies on every conceivable topic blended folksy wisdom with a homespun philosophy on life. On ability: "Whether you think you can or whether you think you can''t, you''re right!" On self-reliance: "Chop your own wood, and it will warm you twice." On altruism: "A business that makes nothing but money is a poor kind of business.
" And the quote for which he would be best remembered: "History is more or less bunk." According to one study, Ford''s wage hike created more than two million lines of favorable advertising on the front pages of newspapers and thousands and thousands of editorial endorsements.11 Ford reveled in his newfound celebrity status. A shameless self-promoter, he used the media to create an entirely new persona, portraying himself as a self-made millionaire who had begun life as the son of a poor farmer in rural Michigan and clawed his way out of poverty to learn a trade and build his first car. He told story after story of the tremendous hardship he had endured as a child. However, according to his sister Margaret, "there was no truth in them." His father was in fact a prosperous landowner who owned a farm along with a number of other enterprises.12 Moreover, Ford assiduously cultivated the myth that he was a mechanical genius, even though his cars were engineered and designed by others.
13 Instead, he assembled some of the finest mechanics available and used their expertise to build his industry. "I don''t like to read books," he once said. "They muss up my mind." According to one reporter who interviewed him, "Outside of business, where he is a genius, his mind is that of a child."14 Testifying years later at a libel suit after the Chicago Tribune called him an "anarchist," Ford--who never even graduated high school--demonstrated the extent of his historical knowledge under questioning by the paper''s lawyer. Asked whether he knew anything about the American Revolution, he responded, "I understand there was one in 1812." Any other time? "I don''t know of any others." What about the one in 1776? "I didn''t pay much attention to such things.
" Did you ever hear of Benedict Arnold? "I have heard the name." Who was he? "I have forgotten just who he is. He is a writer, I think."15 Nothing, however, could diminish Ford''s stature with the public or the press. Countless newspapers called on him to run for President. The letters of admiration poured in by the truckload. And as Ford predicted when he instituted the five-dollar day, his company en.