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Peter Edmund Martin
- Wayne State University Press
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Peter Edmund Martin 1882-1944 "EdMartin and I worked together for thirty-two years with no real break in our relations." —Charles E. Sorensen * Peter Martin and Charles Sorensen went hand in hand as top production bosses during the early years of Ford Motor Company. Both were considered hard as nails. Both were greatly feared by Ford workers. Of the two, however, Martin was less severe in his actions and less anxious, it seems, to gain notoriety as top man in the factory. Henry Ford was very satisfied with both. Peter Edmund Martin was the son of Adolphe Martin, a FrenchCanadian carpenter, and Eleonore Marchildon Martin, who had been married in LaFontaine, Ontario, on June 12, 1881. Peter Martin was born April 17,1882, in Wallaceburg, Ontario. He was the eldest in a family of four boys and three girls. The family moved to Detroit before he was ten years old. At the age of twelve, after only five years of schooling, but with broad shoulders and inventive mind, he was handling a man's job in a Detroit box factory. From there, he went to a can factory, where he operated a stamping machine. Martin was then hired by C. Harold Wills of the Ford Motor Company , and began work at the Mack Avenue plant on December 15,1903. His job was in the "Experimental Room." On April 26, 1904, Martin married Rose Louise Giroux of Detroit, and their home was listed as 452 Mullett Street. In 1905, when Henry Ford moved his operations to the larger Piquette plant, Martin was put in charge of the Experimental Room on the night shift. Then, in February 1906, he was made foreman of the Ford Manufacturing Company, a parts manufacturing shop on Bellevue Avenue in Detroit. By July of that same year, he was put in charge of the Assembly Department of the Piquette plant. In October 1906, Martin was made assistant to Thomas Walburn, who was in charge of all * From Charles E. Sorensen, My Forty Years with Ford (New York: W. W. Norton, 1956), p. 50. 213 Henry's Lieutenants of the manufacturing plants of the company. Sorensen became his assistant. It is obvious that Martin was a hard worker to have risen in rank so rapidly. It is said he was able to operate any machine under his supervision , and he is credited as an accomplished machine designer as well. In 1908, Martin's salary was approximately $2,300 per year, with a bonus of $170. In 1908, at the Piquette plant, Martin, with the help of Sorensen, was responsible for the launching of the Model T. He had to physically reorganize the entire plant to handle the prodigious production required . The increased man-hours and consumer demand led to a strict discipline of the workers, often harsh treatment accompanied by very high turnover. Martin is said to have been a reasonable man, but his superintendents and foremen often played a rough game with the workers. His respect for a man's labor led to Martin's being the only manager later permitted to enter the Rouge plant during a bitter strike. After the infamous "Battle of the Overpass" on May 26, 1937, Walter Reuther of the United Automobile Workers allowed Martin to retrieve personal papers he had left in his desk. In December 1913, at the much larger Highland Park plant, the moving final assembly line reduced automotive assembly time from twelve hours per vehicle to approximately two hours. Martin along with Clarence W. Avery, Sorensen, Wills, and Ford share credit for this accomplishment . Martin also applied time and motion studies to Ford production operations. By 1913, reflecting the tremendous success of the Model T, his bonus alone was $18,000. The Martin family is listed in 1917 as living at 59 Trowbridge in Detroit, with Martin's occupation given as superintendent. On January 3, 1919, only two days after Edsel Ford had become president of Ford Motor Company, Martin was appointed general superintendent of production. Six years later, on December 24, 1924, Martin was named first vice president in charge of manufacturing. This was a period during which Ford was producing record numbers of Model T's at the Highland Park plant, where Martin was headquartered. In addition to his regular salary as vice president, Martin received compensation equivalent to dividends paid to stockholders on 1,000 shares of Ford stock. Martin's former assistant, Sorensen, had left Ford Motor Company in October 1915 to work...