Wheels for the World: Henry Ford, His Company, and a Century of Progress, 1903-2003
Author: Douglas Brinkley
List Price: $34.95
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ISBN: 067003181X
Publisher: Viking Press (28 April, 2003)
Sales Rank: 30,355
Average Customer Rating: 4.15 out of 5
Customer Reviews
Rating: 5 out of 5
How a Car Company Can be a Founding Father
David Brinkley's astounding history of Ford Motor Company is in many ways a history of US industrialism and the essential role it played in powering the "American Century." It can be endlessly argued whether Henry Ford was a brilliant visionary or just in the right place at the right time. But the fact remains that, more than any other individual, Ford turned the crank that started the machinery of mass production. Brinkley's masterfully-written history illustrates how Ford's farsighted approach to high wages and economies-of-scale sparked a self-sustaining explosion of economic growth, leaving America second to none in its productive capacity. Wheels For the World is far more than a book about cars; it's about economics, politics, labor relations, war, racism, corporate intrigue, executive ego, near bankruptcy, and eventual rebirth; it is about a people's faith in themselves and their ability to overcome all obstacles no matter how insurmountable they seem. In the end, Wheels For the World is as much about America as any single book you will ever read.
Rating: 4 out of 5
The Ford Century
I've never read a corporate history before. But I saw an excerpt dealing with the Model-T in "American Heritage" magazine and was immediately hooked.Douglas Brinkley parlays his well-honed historical research skills with an obvious passion for cars and a gift for storytelling in this excellent account of the first century of the Ford Motor Company. The history -- written with the encouragement and cooperation of Ford and particularly its CEO, Bill Ford, Jr -- is a "warts and all" presentation of Ford Motor's out-szed impact on the 20th Century.
The first two-thirds of the book, devoted to the life of Henry Ford, is by far the most interesting. We see a master promoter who had a penchant for co-opting the best ideas of others and for purging the best minds around him. He was also filled with abundant contradications -- the best friend of the "working man" (he summarily doubled wages with the stroke of a pen) who later stood by as his organization violently repressed the budding union movement; the vile anti-semitic (Hitler adopted some of his pronouncements) who was also ahead of his time in minority hiring; a committed (often irrational) pacificist who nevertheless took advantage of military contracts during both world wars; the pioneer who did as much as anyone to advance the industrial age as well as the spread of suburban sprawl, all the while clinging to the quixotic belief that America's redemption lie in a return to the rustic origins of his youth. The list could go on.
The book loses some of its narrative energy in the final chapter (ironically titled, "Momentum"), which is mostly a desultory account of the Ford Explorer tire recall imbroglio as well as a catalog of recent Ford marketing and advertising initiatives. Also, it is obvious that Brinkley finds Bill Ford, Jr. a kindred spirit, but his portrayal of the current Ford CEO is a little too fawning for my taste. For these reasons, I downgraded the book to a four-star rating.
Nevertheless, readers looking for a better understanding of America in the 20th Century will find this book most enjoyable.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Packed with Knowledge!
It would be difficult to conceive of a more detailed corporate history. Author Douglas Brinkley offers an interesting, lucid narrative of Henry Ford's early experiments with the automobile, and his first, unsuccessful companies. He promises and delivers a "warts and all" picture of Ford's history. Brinkley is at his strongest discussing Ford's origins. But the book is also sprawling, diffuse and unfocused, with a somewhat confusing tendency to jump back and forth along the twentieth century timeline. It is more than a biography of Henry Ford, but less than a thorough history of the Ford Motor Company. The author nods in the direction of the technological, managerial and financial forces that have shaped Ford since the 1950s, though he presents Ford's (both man and company) earlier history in vivid detail. The impact of what Henry Ford did and how he did it still shapes industry in the United States. We recommend Brinkley's book for its revealing picture of one of the twentieth century's most influential industrialists. Similar Products
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