Rouge: Pictured in Its Prime

40. Photographic Department

40 PHOTOGRAPHIC DEPARTMENT Henry Ford was an early advocate of photography. He had purchased a still camera for personal use in 1896 and took it to New York when he first met Thomas Edison. He purchased his first moving-picture camera in 1913 and, in 1914, ordered the start of the Ford Motor Company motion-picture department at the Highland Park Plant. With dozens of photographers and elaborate film-processing equipment, the company could boast photographic facilities matching those of Hollywood. Along with still photographs to record manufacturing processes, silent movies of Ford operations were distributed widely as both educational films and as a form of advertising. However, with the popularity of “talkies” during the early 1930s, the increased cost of producing sound on film prohibited Ford’s continued wide use of movies. Approximately 1.5 million feet of Ford silent films, presented to the National Archives in 1963, are identified in the publication Guide to the Ford Collection in the National Archives. Photography as practiced at the Rouge Plant was intended largely for private instructional and record purposes. Photographs recorded both situations about which management felt proud and those with which management had problems. At the Rouge, facilities were much less elaborate and personnel fewer than those at Highland Park in the earlier days. Nevertheless, a single large collection of Rouge 8-by-10-inch still photographs, taken by Ford Motor Company photographers from the beginning of the Rouge Plant in 1917 until the beginning of World War II in 1941, contains more than 75,000 images. It is from that collection that photographs for this book were selected. 246 Opposite, top: Filming a batch of red-hot engine crankshafts in April 1930. (833.65716-H) Opposite, bottom: Filming a scene on the engine assembly line over a pile of hundreds of V-8 engine blocks. Adequate illumination was a necessity. (833.65716) 248 Top: Photographing a technician using Johannson gauge blocks to calibrate a device with which he can very precisely measure the length of a V-8 engine block. (833.65716-B) Bottom: Filming a long moving line of fully assembled engines with attached transmissions on a conveyor taking them to the B building for assembly in vehicles. (833.65716-K) 249 Top: The same photographer at work filming the lowering of an engine and transmission onto an automotive chassis as the chassis moves forward on the assembly line. (833.65716-G) Bottom: The same photographer again filming 1936 Ford cars as they are driven off the final assembly line in the B building. (833.65716-M) 250 At considerable hazard, this photographer and his helper record the manner of operation of a giant silica sand washer while it is in motion on September 27, 1937. (833.68869) Opposite, top: A film-processing area in the photographic department in the administration building. Shown are two Rectograph machines with a dryer between them. (833.83926) Opposite, bottom: This photographic power truck, housed at the administration building, is equipped with electrical generators and long, heavy electrical cables to provide auxiliary illumination whenever and wherever needed. (833.68669-B) ...