My Forty Years with Ford

20. Henry Ford's Greatest Failure

C H A P T E R 20 Henry Ford's Greatest Failure .HENRY FORD's greatest achievement was changing the face of America and putting the world on wheels. His greatest failure was his treatment of his only son, Edsel. And this treatment may have hastened his son's death. The elder Ford wanted Edsel to be like himself. What he forgot, or ignored, was the fact that his father wanted him to be like himsetf. William Ford, Henry's father, was a strongminded , domineering farmer who did all he could to make his son Henry become a farmer,too. But Henry hated farm work, which accounts for his later interest in tractors and other farm machinery. He wanted to—and did—live his own life, and that is what he would not accept gracefully and understandingly in Edsel. Although Edsel was a more dutiful son than his father had been, he might have had an easier life—and probably a longer one—had he deferred more to the elder Ford and his ideas. In two important respects Edsel was like his father: he was an individualist who wanted to live his own life; and, like his father, nothing could move him once he had decided upon a 301 302 MY FORTY YEARS WITH FORD certain course he felt was right. His decisions, though, were unlike his father's. The elder Ford was guided by hunches and intuition. Edsel reasoned out his problems after listening to and tolerating the opinions of others. He wouldn't compromise between what he thought was right and wrong, but he would seek adjusted agreement between extremes. What Henry Ford was unable to realize was that his son could not be a second edition of himself without being a mere copy of the original. Edsel realized that he had a strong-minded father who was a world-famous figure. He knew he could not live up to his father's expectations. He knew his own limitations and did not hesitate to say so. He saw the lack of harmony between Henry Ford and James Couzens and other directors of Ford Motor Company and he could not be happy where there was discord. Yet discord followed him or involved him the rest of his fifty years of life. Henry Ford's idea of harmony was constant turmoil. He wanted his son to get experience the hard way,yet always tried to shield him—wanted him to be both steeplechaser and harness horse. For all their ambition for Edsel to make a name for himself , Father and Mother Ford never wanted their son to grow up. They wanted to keep him close to themselves and to guide his every thought. When Fair Lane, the Ford mansion on the upper River Rouge, was built, the Fords had added a swimming pool, bowling alley, stables for riding horses, a garage full of fine cars, and a small golf course—everything they could think of to retain Edsel's interest at home. Of course, as the world knows, such lures do not hold real boys. Like all normal young people, Edsel wanted to be on his own to see and experience the world. Edsel Ford, the only child of Henry and Clara Bryant Ford, was born in 1893 and named for Edsel Ruddiman, his father's boyhood friend. He was not born to wealth and a large retinue HENRY FORD S GREATEST FAILURE 303 of servants. His father was chief engineer of the Detroit Edison Company at the time and tinkering in off hours with combustion engines. Edsel was one of the first passengers in his father's initial car of 1896. Thus, he grew up with the automobile and Ford Motor Company. During school vacations he often visited the Ford plant, occasionally with his father, sometimes with boys of his own age. He liked to drop in at the pattern shop, where I was making wooden models, and tell me about things he was making at home or in school. After he went back to school, we seldom saw him; but when I was in the plant on Sundays his father would come over and bring Edsel with him. After grammar school, Edsel went to the privately owned Detroit University School which prepared boys for college. Although a college education seemed the natural next step for a young man in his position, Edsel decided to forgo...