VIRTUAL EXHIBIT: Turning Points in Our 120 Year History

Our legacy goes way beyond the cars and trucks that we make. For 120 years, we've used our values, scale and entrepreneurial spirit to build a better world. 

Today the world around us is changing, and Ford+ is our plan to win. The Ford Operating System (Ford OS) will drive the rigor. discipline, clarity and behavior change we need to accelerate growth and unleash innovation.

Our behaviors of Excellence, Focus and Collaboration define what Ford looks like when we're at our best. This virtual exhibit - curated by the Archives team - reinforces how these behaviors are core to our DNA.

• If Henry Ford didn’t have a mindset of Excellence, he may not have innovated and problem solved through two failed business attempts to create the Ford Motor Company in the first place.
• If Edsel Ford didn’t challenge us to Focus on the customer and their needs, then we may have been known as a one-hit-wonder. Instead, we shifted away from the Model T to build the Model A – and it saved our company.
• If the Whiz Kids didn’t Collaborate to implement changes to our business model, then our antiquated business practices may have led to our demise instead of supporting the creation of new systems – ones which resulted in breakthroughs like the Mustang.

Scroll through these three key turning point moments in our history to learn more about how lessons from our past can help propel our future. 

At the dawn of modern transportation, the race was on to become the first major automaker in America. When Ford was founded in 1903, the competition was fierce: more than one thousand automobile manufacturers vied to put the world on wheels. But it was Ford Motor Company that assembled the vehicles that changed the way people thought and lived – and changed the world.

Henry Ford’s success didn’t happen overnight. His first company, The Detroit Automobile Company, survived no more than eighteen months because it offered a poor vehicle, and was followed by another failed attempt: the Henry Ford Company in 1901. The business we know today as Ford Motor Company was actually Ford’s third attempt at building a profitable, efficient automobile company – which took years of experiments, tinkering, failure and trying again to reach the level of excellence required to succeed. 

The Ford Motor Company was founded on the ideals of product excellence, lean manufacturing, innovation and zero waste. Our extreme focus on efficiency even led to further innovation, like when efficient disposal of Ford’s lumber byproducts turned into a multi-million dollar business. 

This mindset also underpins our philosophy to find the most efficient locations and lowest-waste ways to get work done. You’ll see this throughout Ford’s history, where early on we moved operations to where raw materials were such as lumber, limestone and iron ore in Northern Michigan, and through the construction of the Rouge factory that was vertically integrated unlike the world had ever seen. 

Now, a century later, our historic investments in BlueOval City, Tennessee, Marshall, Michigan and other strategic campuses are helping usher in a new era of clean, carbon neutral manufacturing.

Byproducts Division 

From the beginning, Ford was always a model of efficient innovation. The company eliminated vast amounts of production waste by reinventing the materials as consumer products, such as cement, Benzol, lumber and gas. Our Byproducts division, founded in 1924, grew to a multimillion-dollar enterprise by the end of the 1920s, less than a decade later. This foundation of efficiency can still be seen today in our Lean Manufacturing processes.  

Fertilizer Bag  

This nitrogen-rich inorganic fertilizer was one of the multiple byproducts of Ford’s production process at the Rouge Steel plant. Other byproducts packaged and sold by Ford’s Byproducts Sales department, organized in 1924, included cement, motor benzol and gas. By 1929, the Company produced nearly 17,500 tons of Ammonium Sulphate fertilizer, which generated just over $825,000 in sales (around $14 million today). 

Charcoal Briquette Package  

Beginning in 1924, Ford began to use byproducts of its northern Michigan lumber operations to produce charcoal briquettes, in the city of Kingsford, as an effort to reduce waste. Other innovative lumbering byproducts were sold, such as as hardwood pitch and wood alcohol (methanol). In 1929, the Company produced just over 20,700 tons of charcoal briquette, which generated over $509,000 in sales (around $9 million today).   

What Ford built was different from the rest. While other leading manufacturers focused on luxury vehicles for the elite, Ford’s Model T was built for everybody. It was dependable and accessible, easily distributed through service centers and dealers. And it was sold at a price that average consumers could aspire to reach. Ford was the first manufacturer to create a means of personal transportation that was widely affordable.  

As the company grew, Henry Ford’s ingenuity and focus on efficiency continued to break barriers in the industry. Our success was fueled by innovation – the moving assembly line, the $5 workday, and a reliable Model T that opened the highways to the masses. 

In some cases, though, we weren’t always the best at focusing on the right things.

In fact, Henry Ford’s obsession with the X-8 engine throughout the 1920s diverted resources away from developing a new car to keep up with the competition and drove deep divisions inside the company.

Then his son Edsel Ford stepped in, finally convincing Henry to let him develop an all-new vehicle. The resulting Model A’s stylish lines and new features responded to changing times and customers. The Model A was the first Ford assembled at the Rouge and the first product to bear the blue oval. It was a design sensation and sales leader.  

Time and time again, when we focus on what matters – our customers – we are unstoppable. 

Moving Assembly Line

After much trial and error, in 1913 the moving assembly line successfully began building Model Ts at our Highland Park assembly plant. For the first time, workers stayed in one place, while vehicles moved slowly along the line. One of the most important outcomes of this innovation was the drastic drop in price of the Model T. In 1908, the car sold for $825. By 1925, it sold for only $260, opening vast markets by making the car radically more affordable to individuals everywhere.  

Opening the Highways Advertisement  

In 1924-25, Ford Motor Company ran a series of sixteen dramatic advertisements in the Saturday Evening Post and Country Gentleman magazines. Rather than promoting the Model T specifically, the ads aimed to convey the company's scale and philosophy. This final ad of the series, “Opening the Highways to All Mankind,” emphasizes the company as service-oriented, mission-based and transformative.

X-8 Engine and Patent

The odd-looking X-shaped engine has two banks of four cylinders arranged around a central crankshaft. This X-8 layout fascinated Henry Ford and in 1920 he launched a secret project and committed millions of dollars to build such an engine for his beloved Model T. But others in the Company felt it was time to launch an all-new product, and in time, they eventually won, as the X-8 proved to be a flawed concept. Ford finally abandoned the project in 1926.

1928 Model A Advertisements 

Introduced in late 1927, the 1928 Model A was an immediate sensation, with nearly 10 million people around the country viewing it the first week. The new Ford was lower and sleeker than the Model T and had beautiful bodylines that were the direct influence of Edsel Ford’s styling. It was also more powerful than the Model T, safer and more comfortable, with a Triplex shatterproof safety windshield and hydraulic shocks, both a first for Ford. The Model A was the first Ford to carry the famous blue oval logo and the first car assembled at the new Rouge manufacturing complex. It got its name from Henry Ford, who said that the car was so new and different that they would “wipe the slate clean and start all over again with Model A.”

Ford helped create the Arsenal of Democracy to win World War II, but after the war was won, the company Henry Ford II took over was in trouble.  

Enter the Whiz Kids, 10 Air Force veterans whose wartime logistics expertise put Ford on a new path to profitability.  

They reviewed the company from top to bottom and found a lack of coordination and organization, which allowed waste and antiquated business practices to thrive. Our own operations were threatening our survival – not unlike today.  

The Whiz Kids proposed a plan to minimize waste and modernize operations, with a strict reliance on financial reporting and business planning. They also proposed targeted marketing research to understand our customers and their needs. 

Their new systems supported the creation of the Mustang – an immediate icon built for the next generation of customers. And today, diverse, cross-functional collaborations are helping us build – and electrify – the next generation of Mustang to be better-than-ever. 

This spirit of purposeful collaboration underpins our icons, big bets and cultural breakthroughs, today and forever.

Whiz Kid Telegram  

In 1945, Henry Ford II received a telegram from future Whiz Kid Charles "Tex" Thornton, then a colonel in the U.S. Air Force. The telegram proposed that Ford enact a system of statistical control, which had been developed and used successfully in military management. Henry Ford II had recently assumed control of his grandfather's troubled company and was looking for experienced business leaders and auto industry professionals to help him institute the changes necessary to make Ford successful again.   

Whiz Kid 1947 Report  

This Company financial and operations review report, from December 1947, was the first issued by the Whiz Kids. Months of fact-gathering by the team across all functions of the enterprise revealed a lack of coordination and organization, with instances of waste and outdated practices which were strangling the Company. The Whiz Kids’ proposed path to profitability and success required the adoption of modern corporate policies and procedures, company-wide organizational charts, clearly defined roles and responsibilities and, above all else, strict financial accounting.

The Whiz Kids, Featuring Miller, McNamara, Lundy

The 10 Air Force Statistical Control officers in the front row were the Whiz Kids. This is the only photo that shows all 10 of them together. They all had an impact on our business, but three stand out. 

Arjay Miller rose through the ranks of administration and finance to become the second Whiz Kid to serve as Company President, from 1963 to 1968. He also served on the Board of Directors from 1962 until 1969.  

J. Edward Lundy introduced financial management and forecasting systems, many of which are still used today. He was Chief Financial Officer from 1967-1979 and served on the Board of Directors until 1985.  

Robert McNamara was one of the first proponents of incorporating safety into automobiles. He pushed the use of computers to manage data and became Company President in November 1960. Weeks later, he resigned to become Secretary of Defense for the Kennedy administration.

Share and celebrate your part in these pivotal Ford moments on BlueOvalNow, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter with these customizable and unique assets. 

If you would like to see the above artifacts in person, visit the exhibit on display at WHQ through June 9 and FXC June 13-16.