House of Wax
06-03-2015, 11:34 PM
Pretty cool read
Edsel Ford Built The Bombers That Paved The Way For D-Day - Investors.com (http://news.investors.com/management-leaders-and-success/060215-755295-edsel-ford-revolutionized-aircraft-manufacturing.htm?p=3)
Edsel Ford was one of the masterminds of the Allied victory in World War II. Today, the son of the founder of Ford Motor (NYSE:F)is mainly remembered for the Edsel, a failed 1958-60 car model.
Yet, against the wishes of his father, it was Edsel who transformed the firm`s factories into powerhouses that turned out:
• 9,000 B-24 Liberator bombers.
• 278,000 Jeeps.
• 93,000 military trucks.
• 12,000 armored cars.
• 3,000 tanks and 27,000 tank engines.
The Liberator pounded Nazi positions at Normandy to make way for the D-Day invasion of June 6, 1944, and played a crucial role in the victory over Japan.
"He was gentle, considerate of others, unsparing of himself — and he was a man," said Charlie Sorensen, Ford Motor manager.
"Edsel could have walked away from the family business as a young man and led a life of luxury," A.J. Baime, author of "The Arsenal of Democracy: FDR, Detroit and an Epic Quest to Arm an America at War," told IBD. "Instead, despite the fact that he was dying and having to endure his father`s domineering behavior, Edsel earned the respect of all who worked with him to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles to the Allied victory."
On The Way Up
Edsel (1893-1943) was born poor, but after Henry founded the car company in 1903, the family became rich. The patriarch`s greatest innovation was the assembly line for the plant on the River Rouge in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn.
Edsel joined Dad full time after high school, then in 1916 married Eleanor Clay from a prominent family. They had a daughter and three sons, one of whom, Henry II, would become the company`s president.
In 1919, Henry officially made Edsel, 25, president of the company, claiming that he wanted to "pursue other ventures."
Both shared a fascination with aviation and saw huge potential.
In 1925, the firm bought Stout Metal Airplane Co., the first builder of all-metal commercial aircraft.
Soon Ford Motor was the largest maker of commercial planes, with a private airport that was one of the busiest. Edsel became civil aviation`s greatest booster, offering prizes for cross-country tours to prove its safety. He also sponsored Adm. Richard Byrd`s flights over the North and South poles.
By 1927, Henry and Edsel Ford together were worth $1.2 billion (the equivalent to $16.3 billion today), making them the world`s richest men.
Edsel had become a friend of future President Franklin Roosevelt, and on a 1928 visit to Warm Springs, Ga., where FDR went to soothe his polio-riddled body, he donated $25,000 to found the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, later known as the March of Dimes.
But the Great Depression caused the Ford plane business to nose-dive and the car division to crash.
By 1936, Ford`s auto market share had dropped from first to third, which made for the strained relationship between father and son.
"Henry loved his only child, but he began to feel he`d had little success in molding a successor in his own crafty, hard-boiled image," wrote Richard Bak in "Henry and Edsel: The Creation of the Ford Empire." "He had trouble accepting Edsel`s urbane, sophisticated tastes, which ran counter to his in almost every way. Edsel liked reading the New Yorker and Kipling; Henry slapped his bony knee over `Little Orphan Annie` cartoons and cornball jokes. Edsel smoked Camels and drank highballs; Henry was a teetotaler who did not allow tobacco of any kind on company property. Edsel was a philanthropist; Henry didn`t believe in charity."
Edsel Ford`s B-24 Liberator hammered Nazi positions amid the Allied invasion of Normandy, France, in 1944.
Their differences extended to the automobile. Edsel had a gift for design; Henry wanted to make only black and basic Model T`s.
Doing The Continental
"Edsel accomplished a great deal, in addition to overseeing massive expansion of their factories and the administration of global operations," said George Cook, executive professor at the University of Rochester business school and a former Ford executive. "He insisted that the Model A of 1928 have four-wheel mechanical brakes and a sliding-gear transmission, as well as an iconic design. He developed the famous Mercury 8 in 1939, which had a V-8 engine and hydraulic brakes, both of which his father opposed. The Lincoln Continental was based on Edsel`s personal car."
On Dec. 29, 1940, President Roosevelt read a speech over radio to encourage U.S. companies to make military supplies for Britain.
The Army Air Corps had only 1,300 combat planes. All were outdated, while Germany was making 18,000 cutting-edge aircraft a year.
The Navy was strong but vulnerable to enemy submarines.
The Army of 200,000 compared with Germany`s 7 million.
Roosevelt patched up relations with business leaders and hired William Knudsen, the president of General Motors (NYSE:GM), to oversee defense manufacturing.
Edsel and Ford manager Charlie Sorensen met with Knudsen in June 1941 and agreed to make 9,000 Rolls-Royce Merlin aircraft engines. But when they returned to Detroit, Henry canceled the order because he thought wars were unnecessary and didn`t want America involved in Europe.
Soon Edsel experienced intense stomach pain. Those around him assumed the cause was an ulcer caused by working with his father, but doctors couldn`t diagnose it.
After the Pearl Harbor attack on Dec. 7, 1941, Edsel convinced his father that the time had come to choose sides in the global clash between the forces of good and evil.
Wide Turn
Henry reluctantly gave in, and Ford car production soon ended to shift into a war footing.
"From that moment on, Edsel hurled the family empire into aviation manufacturing, despite Sorensen`s observation that they were moving `fast and dangerously,`" said Baime. "Edsel had declared a goal of turning out one B-24 Liberator per hour at a time when the only manufacturer was making less than a dozen a month. It was over 66 feet long with a wingspan of 110 feet, and four engines with combined power equal to 56 Ford V8s. It could fly 300 mph for 3,000 miles with a payload equivalent to 8,000 pounds of TNT."
Ford Motor was building the world`s largest factory at Willow Run near Detroit at a cost of $47 million (worth $755 million today). Special equipment had to be designed to adapt plane making to Ford`s assembly line production.
Construction went on around the clock; Edsel worked 16-hour days. Roosevelt came to visit in September 1942, soon after its 35,000 workers had produced the first bomber.
In January 1943, Edsel had stomach surgery, and inoperable tumors were discovered. Wife Eleanor begged him to stop working, but he was committed to spending his final days trying to reach his goal of one bomber per hour, which would be achieved later that year.
Edsel Ford died at age 49.
One newspaper editorialized that "probably the loss of no other corporate head would have the same import and create as many problems" for the war effort.
One month after D-Day, the Willow Run plant met Edsel`s goal of producing one B-24 per hour.
"Edsel Ford was one of the great industrial leaders in world history," said Cook, "and he deserves to be remembered as someone whose personal sacrifice made him an unsung hero of World War II."
Edsel Ford Built The Bombers That Paved The Way For D-Day - Investors.com (http://news.investors.com/management-leaders-and-success/060215-755295-edsel-ford-revolutionized-aircraft-manufacturing.htm?p=3)
Edsel Ford Built The Bombers That Paved The Way For D-Day - Investors.com (http://news.investors.com/management-leaders-and-success/060215-755295-edsel-ford-revolutionized-aircraft-manufacturing.htm?p=3)
Edsel Ford was one of the masterminds of the Allied victory in World War II. Today, the son of the founder of Ford Motor (NYSE:F)is mainly remembered for the Edsel, a failed 1958-60 car model.
Yet, against the wishes of his father, it was Edsel who transformed the firm`s factories into powerhouses that turned out:
• 9,000 B-24 Liberator bombers.
• 278,000 Jeeps.
• 93,000 military trucks.
• 12,000 armored cars.
• 3,000 tanks and 27,000 tank engines.
The Liberator pounded Nazi positions at Normandy to make way for the D-Day invasion of June 6, 1944, and played a crucial role in the victory over Japan.
"He was gentle, considerate of others, unsparing of himself — and he was a man," said Charlie Sorensen, Ford Motor manager.
"Edsel could have walked away from the family business as a young man and led a life of luxury," A.J. Baime, author of "The Arsenal of Democracy: FDR, Detroit and an Epic Quest to Arm an America at War," told IBD. "Instead, despite the fact that he was dying and having to endure his father`s domineering behavior, Edsel earned the respect of all who worked with him to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles to the Allied victory."
On The Way Up
Edsel (1893-1943) was born poor, but after Henry founded the car company in 1903, the family became rich. The patriarch`s greatest innovation was the assembly line for the plant on the River Rouge in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn.
Edsel joined Dad full time after high school, then in 1916 married Eleanor Clay from a prominent family. They had a daughter and three sons, one of whom, Henry II, would become the company`s president.
In 1919, Henry officially made Edsel, 25, president of the company, claiming that he wanted to "pursue other ventures."
Both shared a fascination with aviation and saw huge potential.
In 1925, the firm bought Stout Metal Airplane Co., the first builder of all-metal commercial aircraft.
Soon Ford Motor was the largest maker of commercial planes, with a private airport that was one of the busiest. Edsel became civil aviation`s greatest booster, offering prizes for cross-country tours to prove its safety. He also sponsored Adm. Richard Byrd`s flights over the North and South poles.
By 1927, Henry and Edsel Ford together were worth $1.2 billion (the equivalent to $16.3 billion today), making them the world`s richest men.
Edsel had become a friend of future President Franklin Roosevelt, and on a 1928 visit to Warm Springs, Ga., where FDR went to soothe his polio-riddled body, he donated $25,000 to found the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, later known as the March of Dimes.
But the Great Depression caused the Ford plane business to nose-dive and the car division to crash.
By 1936, Ford`s auto market share had dropped from first to third, which made for the strained relationship between father and son.
"Henry loved his only child, but he began to feel he`d had little success in molding a successor in his own crafty, hard-boiled image," wrote Richard Bak in "Henry and Edsel: The Creation of the Ford Empire." "He had trouble accepting Edsel`s urbane, sophisticated tastes, which ran counter to his in almost every way. Edsel liked reading the New Yorker and Kipling; Henry slapped his bony knee over `Little Orphan Annie` cartoons and cornball jokes. Edsel smoked Camels and drank highballs; Henry was a teetotaler who did not allow tobacco of any kind on company property. Edsel was a philanthropist; Henry didn`t believe in charity."
Edsel Ford`s B-24 Liberator hammered Nazi positions amid the Allied invasion of Normandy, France, in 1944.
Their differences extended to the automobile. Edsel had a gift for design; Henry wanted to make only black and basic Model T`s.
Doing The Continental
"Edsel accomplished a great deal, in addition to overseeing massive expansion of their factories and the administration of global operations," said George Cook, executive professor at the University of Rochester business school and a former Ford executive. "He insisted that the Model A of 1928 have four-wheel mechanical brakes and a sliding-gear transmission, as well as an iconic design. He developed the famous Mercury 8 in 1939, which had a V-8 engine and hydraulic brakes, both of which his father opposed. The Lincoln Continental was based on Edsel`s personal car."
On Dec. 29, 1940, President Roosevelt read a speech over radio to encourage U.S. companies to make military supplies for Britain.
The Army Air Corps had only 1,300 combat planes. All were outdated, while Germany was making 18,000 cutting-edge aircraft a year.
The Navy was strong but vulnerable to enemy submarines.
The Army of 200,000 compared with Germany`s 7 million.
Roosevelt patched up relations with business leaders and hired William Knudsen, the president of General Motors (NYSE:GM), to oversee defense manufacturing.
Edsel and Ford manager Charlie Sorensen met with Knudsen in June 1941 and agreed to make 9,000 Rolls-Royce Merlin aircraft engines. But when they returned to Detroit, Henry canceled the order because he thought wars were unnecessary and didn`t want America involved in Europe.
Soon Edsel experienced intense stomach pain. Those around him assumed the cause was an ulcer caused by working with his father, but doctors couldn`t diagnose it.
After the Pearl Harbor attack on Dec. 7, 1941, Edsel convinced his father that the time had come to choose sides in the global clash between the forces of good and evil.
Wide Turn
Henry reluctantly gave in, and Ford car production soon ended to shift into a war footing.
"From that moment on, Edsel hurled the family empire into aviation manufacturing, despite Sorensen`s observation that they were moving `fast and dangerously,`" said Baime. "Edsel had declared a goal of turning out one B-24 Liberator per hour at a time when the only manufacturer was making less than a dozen a month. It was over 66 feet long with a wingspan of 110 feet, and four engines with combined power equal to 56 Ford V8s. It could fly 300 mph for 3,000 miles with a payload equivalent to 8,000 pounds of TNT."
Ford Motor was building the world`s largest factory at Willow Run near Detroit at a cost of $47 million (worth $755 million today). Special equipment had to be designed to adapt plane making to Ford`s assembly line production.
Construction went on around the clock; Edsel worked 16-hour days. Roosevelt came to visit in September 1942, soon after its 35,000 workers had produced the first bomber.
In January 1943, Edsel had stomach surgery, and inoperable tumors were discovered. Wife Eleanor begged him to stop working, but he was committed to spending his final days trying to reach his goal of one bomber per hour, which would be achieved later that year.
Edsel Ford died at age 49.
One newspaper editorialized that "probably the loss of no other corporate head would have the same import and create as many problems" for the war effort.
One month after D-Day, the Willow Run plant met Edsel`s goal of producing one B-24 per hour.
"Edsel Ford was one of the great industrial leaders in world history," said Cook, "and he deserves to be remembered as someone whose personal sacrifice made him an unsung hero of World War II."
Edsel Ford Built The Bombers That Paved The Way For D-Day - Investors.com (http://news.investors.com/management-leaders-and-success/060215-755295-edsel-ford-revolutionized-aircraft-manufacturing.htm?p=3)