# The Men Who Built America (Interesting Documentary)



## SpIcEz (Jan 8, 2013)

http://www.history.com/shows/men-who-built-america
The Men Who Built America

Saw this documentary last week, its about the birth of the industrial age and the 4-5 men responsible for it all.
Ruthless, but very smart business men.

Its very interesting.

Cornelius Vanderbilt "The Commodore" (Railways)
John D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil)
Andrew Carnegie (Carnegie Steel)
John Pierpont Morgan (Finance, Railways, Electricity, Steel, and the list goes on and on...)
Henry Ford (Manufacturing, Auto industry)


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Saw the H2 channel documentary on Henry Ford. He was ruthless tyrant to say the least. He hated unions and he hated the Jews as well. Henry bought his own paper and printed all sorts of drivel how the Jews were responsible for the '29 crash and the plight of American economy.

This was pre-WWII and Hitler found out about his Antisemitism and this encouraged Hitler of course, because Henry Ford's published rants re-inforced Hitlers own political views in Mein Kampf. (My Struggle). Hitler even invited Henry Ford to come to Germany to visit him to find out about mass production
line ideas. 
Henry didn't believe in paying his initial shareholders anything from the profits of the Ford Motor Company. as far as he was concerned, all the profits earned
belonged to Henry Ford. The investors had to take him to court and Ford ended up paying huge settlements. Ford bought out his investors and ran the production factories with an iron hand. Ford hired immigrants to work in his factories and paid them very little during the depression days. 

Yes, he came up with the production line idea, and made the automobile affordable to the working man, but he had his own ingrained faults that didn't make him shine as a benefactor in the eyes of the general working public. If he helped to build America, it was off the backs of the poor immigrant workers that he took advantage of...and that still seems to hold true in the US today.


----------



## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

carverman said:


> Mein Kampf. (My Life).


"My Struggle"?


----------



## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Antisemitism was hardly unusual, at that time. Ford was also far from the only US big business figure to have ties with the Nazi regime.

The way I look at it is this. These people are not interesting because of their morality, but because they had significant impacts on the course of events. I don't see any of them as 'heroes'.


----------



## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

carverman said:


> Mein Kampf. (My Life).





Nemo2 said:


> "My Struggle"?


That book is nothing more than a pile or raving, ranting, and rambling.
I have read it two times cover to cover to find an iota of evidence for the megalomania and cult following that it created during the Nazi regime, but there is nothing.
Granted, it was written over a period of time and most of it while Hitler was in prison, but there is not one coherent or logical thought in that entire book.


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Yes, sorry you are correct. Just came back from the dentist..still under the influence of local narcotics.:biggrin:

he wrote his memoirs in Landsberg prison in 1924.


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> That book is nothing more than a pile or raving, ranting, and rambling.
> I have read it two times cover to cover to find an iota of evidence for the megalomania and cult following that it created during the Nazi regime, but there is nothing.
> Granted, it was written over a period of time and most of it while Hitler was in prison, but there is not one coherent or logical thought in that entire book.


True, he went off the deep end while in prison and was a hostile witness to the judges at his trial for being part of the Putsch. 

However, I don't want to get into Hitler in this thread..just trying to point out that some of the great American industrialists seemed to have some connection with
Nazi Germany..at least until Pearl Harbor in 1941.



> Ford was also widely known for his pacifism during the first years of World War I, but also for being the publisher of antisemitic texts such as the book The International Jew.


http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Car_Connection_TWE.html




> Ford was one of the few people singled out for praise in Mein Kampf. At Hitler's trial in 1924,
> 
> 
> > Erhard Auer of the Bavarian Diet testified that Ford had given Hitler money
> ...


and General Motors didn't have clean hands either..


> By the mid-1930s, General Motors was committed to full-scale production of trucks, armored cars, and tanks in Nazi Germany.


----------



## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

Not meaning to further deviate from course, but so were members of the prominent English Mitford family...... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unity_Mitford......and numerous other British 'aristocrats/elite', (those that weren't Soviet sympathizers, that is).........what is it about the privileged that draws them to extremist views?


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Nemo2 said:


> Not meaning to further deviate from course, but so were members of the prominent English Mitford family...... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unity_...d-news/35581/how-america-inspired-third-reich


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

Sounds like the usual hokum. I have made a study of US industrialists especially the auto industry from the late 19th century to the mid 20th century.

What eventually struck me the most was how the most successful businessmen did NOT fit the popular image of the hard driving money mad dog eat dog capitalist.

What struck me was how smart most of them were, and how good they were at absorbing information, analyzing trends, the art of persuasion, and eliciting cooperation and loyalty.

Henry Ford's antisemitism is much overblown. It came out of his anti war activities during WW1 (yes, an anti war capitalist during war time. Who would have thought?). He said at one time, that he would give his entire fortune to end the war if he could, and he backed this up by spending $400,000 on his Peace Ship effort to negotiate peace.

It was the socialists in this party (some of them Jewish) who convinced him the Jewish bankers were behind the war. He held to this view until 1927 when he changed his mind, decided he had been fooled, and abandoned his antisemitic views. He shut down the Dearborn Independent and burned a large, costly collection of antisemitic literature.

So, he was an antisemite for 10 or 12 years ending in 1927.

It is also true that Ford was very much pro labor, and was interested in better living conditions for his employees. To this end he created his "Sociological Department" in 1915. Its purpose was to investigate housing, food, utilities, costs, living conditions etc. and look for ways to improve them. This experiment was short lived, the workers resented what they called "snoops" and "spies" and the department was soon shut down because of their protests.

He also established the $5 day of eight hours, when the going rate in the auto industry was half that for a 10 or 12 hour day.

One thing that did survive was the Ford store where food, much of it grown on Ford experimental farms, was sold at cost along with a lot of other goods. Supposedly only Ford workers were allowed to shop there but there were stories of non Ford employees taking advantage of the bargains.

There is a story that in the early 40s the union threatened a strike. While discussing this with an executive he went off in a rant about how he had always been for labor, had always been in favor of better working conditions, better pay etc. Then he asked what the strike was about. "It's the check off system" " What's that?" " They want you to deduct the union dues from the mens' pay checks and send it to the union" "What's the matter with that? Why don't you give it to them?". End of strike talk.

To me the truth is more interesting than fiction but it is also harder to get at. Especially digging out old books and original sources. I realize not many people feel this way.


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

I also find it amusing that anybody thinks anyone outside the Nazi party had anything to say about industrial policy in Germany from 1934 to 1945.

1934 was the year Hitler declared a national emergency and put the country under martial law, suspending elections and making himself absolute dictator.

General Motors actually wrote off their German plants and investments on their income tax during WW2. I believe they had to make an adjustment after 1945 when they got them back, or what was left of them.


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

Would it surprise you to find out that Roosevelt recognized Hitler as the legitimate ruler of Germany and the US was neutral up to 1941? Or that the US fought on the same side as the USSR during WW2? *GASP*


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

To me one of the most fascinating things about John D Rockefeller is that he was the exact opposite of the way he is usually portrayed, and that was the secret of his success.

As a young man he was known as "the Deacon" for his religious and moral fervor. He taught Sunday school for years and attended the same church in Cleveland long after he became one of the wealthiest men in America. He also donated large sums to the church and to charity, even before he became rich.

The oil business was a wild and wooly affair back then, famous for booms and busts, phony stock promotions, and shenanigans of all kinds. In this crowd of rounders Rockefeller stood out like Billy Graham in a Texas saloon.

When other oil men came and went, Standard Oil went on bringing good products to market at lower and lower prices. When he started kerosene cost 50 cents a gallon, in 30 years he got the price down to 6 cents a gallon, and made a profit.

Eventually he built up a world wide business. In his mid fifties he gradually withdrew from business and retired, devoting the rest of his life to philanthropy including founding the University of Chicago and the Rockefeller Foundation among other things.

Through all this he basically ignored a storm of criticism that would have driven a lesser man crazy.

One defender pointed out that if a man is mean, grasping, and prone to chisel his employees will feel it first. But the Standard Oil company never had any labor trouble while Rockefeller was in charge. Most of his executives and top managers stayed with the company for many years.


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

When Ferdinand Porsche was designing the VW beetle in the 1930s he visited Detroit twice, once in 1933 or 34 and again in 1937. This was to learn about the latest mass production methods and design trends. He toured the Ford plant both times, a courtesy extended to thousands of visiting dignitaries over the years. The second time he had an interview with Henry Ford himself. He asked why he was allowed to see all the Ford facilities, wasn't Ford afraid of giving up his secrets? Ford thought for a moment and said "If you can make a better car than I can, it serves me right".

I don't think he was very worried lol.

See if you can detect the similarity of this car to the VW beetle. 

http://www.idsa.org/briggs-dream-car-1933

VW even copied the "wide 5" wheel bolt pattern used by Ford from 1937 to 1939.


----------



## SpIcEz (Jan 8, 2013)

In all honesty, Henry Ford is only a very small part of this documentary towards the end.
He is there to show the switch from the old guard, to the new way of doing business in America.
I agree with Rusty here, Ford was a visionary, not only in his way of making cars, but also in making sure his employees where well paid, so that they could afford the products he was making.

Rusty, I think you will enjoy this one, even though as I and you probably know, not everything is 100% factual, or some details are missing, the overall image painted of these men is the same you have been describing here.


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

That's a pretty good synopsis, Rusty. 

Ford was bit of an enigma..a curious mix of old world views vs modern world requirements, and it seemed he had some issues with the modern world.

He was definitely a control freak. If his engineers came up with a new idea or improvement on an old one, if he was not involved with the decision process, he would go into a rage and tell them to scrap everything they had come up with. When his son Edsel took over an wanted to build a new office building while the old man was away, when the old man came back and saw the hole in the ground for the foundation, he forbade the son to continue with the expansion project because it wasn't HIS idea in the first place.

When the son asked what he should do with the huge excavation started...the old man said " just leave it there"..to humiliate the son. 

In spite of his anti-semitic views and clinging to old world (farming) principles, the Ford Motor company did manage to progress with the huge Rouge River complex, which was one of the largest (maybe even the largest at the time) manufacturing process in the world. 
Iron ore came in on great lake freighters , and the smelting for the steel was done right there on the Rouge river factory property. 

He even toyed with growing his own rubber on a plantation in Brazil. So in one way, he had vision for expanding an empire, but after his strokes, it was
downhill for him as he became disagreeable on practically everything, yet refused to give up complete control. 

Certainly an enigma..on one hand he had ideas that changed the way manufactured items could be made faster and cheaper..and on the other hand, his uneducated farming roots were still there and that's where he preferred to be in the last few years of his life.

One of the famous lines from H. Ford was "chop your own wood..it will warm you twice".. He was a big fan of keeping fit through manual labour on the farm.


----------



## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

Rusty O'Toole said:


> Would it surprise you to find out that Roosevelt recognized Hitler as the legitimate ruler of Germany and the US was neutral up to 1941? Or that the US fought on the same side as the USSR during WW2? *GASP*


Well, it was only after Nazi Germany decided to invade Stalinist USSR.
Stalin split from the Axis Powers and joined the Allies.
However, from 1939 till the summer of 1941, the USSR was part of the Axis Powers alliance.

Ironically, that single event is perhaps the most crucial in WW-II, perhaps even more than the Normandy Landings.
Had Hitler not lost his head and invaded the USSR, the world might look very different right now in 2013....


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Rusty O'Toole said:


> Would it surprise you to find out that Roosevelt recognized Hitler as the legitimate ruler of Germany and the US was neutral up to 1941? Or that the US fought on the same side as the USSR during WW2? *GASP*


No, not surprised. I've read the book on Adolph Hitler (by John Toland). 

When he became chancellor (sneaking into the position by "eliminating" his competition for that position, just like now, a chancellor in Germany is basically a prime minister/leader. The US had no choice but help Stalin because they were forced to become allies with Stalin in order to defeat Hitler. 

Up until Stalingrad, (1941) there was no stopping Hitler, and before Hitler invaded Poland in Sept 1939, there was a "pact of
steel" that Hitler formed with Stalin to take advantage of the resources of the soviet union. Steel/raw materials/wheat was shipped from Russia to Germany in 
exchange for finished goods going back to Russia.and they agreed to carve up the Baltic states once they occupied them.

Everything was going good with their little arrangement until Hitler decided to invade the Ukraine...after that they became enemies. The US thought they could
just sit it out on the sidelines until Japan bombed Pearl Harbour...and then they had no choice but help Britain and France, and some lend lease for Stalin.


----------



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> Ironically, that single event is perhaps the most crucial in WW-II, perhaps even more than the Normandy Landings.
> Had Hitler not lost his head and invaded the USSR, the world might look very different right now in 2013....


Hitler lost his gamble for domination because of the Russian winter and the inabilty to supply the troops with airpower. 
He lost a great deal of military strength when they surrendered in Stalingrad...but Hitler was still very strong on the western front.

It was the continuous bombing of the Ruhr factories and aircraft plants that started to weaken Hitler's war production.
The US 6th? airforce and the British bombers played a huge part in that. 

The Germans were still strong during the battle of the bulge, but became weaker afterwards. Hitler became more insane and 
made tactical decision errors at the last part of the war, especially after the failed attempt on his life by some of the generals.

After he eradicated some of them, none of the remaining generals would dare to suggest alternatives...and that was also a major
factor in Germany's defeat..in Russia and Normandy. 

I believe that had he kept his cool (like Eisenhower), and delegated the military decisions to the generals, the outcome might have been a lot different for the world.

Air power was the key to military success after 1941, and the luftwaffe was greaty weakened after 1944.


----------



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

I have read several biographies of Ford and considered him quite an intriguing personality. Eventually I found the key - he was a Michigan farm boy with a grade 3 education and in spite of his wealth and experience, remained one until he died. Everything he did and said in life was consistent with this. His business ethics, hatred of bankers and capitalists, isolationism, populism, antisemitism, Masonic lodge membership, if he had been a small town feed and grain dealer none of this would have raised an eyebrow.

He sued a newspaper for calling him "an ignorant pacifist". He sued, and won 6 cents damages. His examination on the witness stand was one of the great humiliations of his life. It pretty well proved he could not pass a grade school examination in history, geography, or anything else.

One of his biographers had access to a series of pocket notebooks in which Ford recorded his thoughts. Tales of the Vienna Woods, one of his favorite pieces of music, was mentioned nine times. He never spelled it the same way twice.

He had a lot of quirky ideas regarding reincarnation, smoking, drinking, and a lot of other things. It should be kept in mind that when he came to prominence in the 1920s he was already 60 years old. His ideas were not out of line with other crotchety old coots of his generation.

It is said that conspiracy theory is the sophistication of the ignorant, and that fits Ford to a T. Surprisingly, he did not think his antisemitism was offensive to Jews at large. He was aiming at some vague clique of multimillionaires pulling strings somewhere off in the distance. When his old friend Rabbi Franklin turned down the gift of a new Ford, he was hurt and surprised. He had other Jewish friends and employed numerous Jews. Albert Kahn built millions of dollars worth of factories and other buildings for Ford.

When he expressed admiration for a Jew or Catholic, a friend questioned his sincerity. Ford would answer "He's not a pure Jew. He's mixed"or "He's not a good Catholic".

So, if he didn't like someone, it was because they were Jewish or Catholic. If he liked them, that didn't count. Strange guy.

Next question, how did this half educated boob become one of the richest men in the world? I can tell you that, too. If you can absorb and apply this lesson you too can become immensely successful in anything you attempt, and I am not joking or jesting in the slightest.

He had a truly amazing ability to stick with an idea when it worked, and drop an idea that did not work, and never look back.

Let me explain. Everyone knows he made his fortune off the Model T which he produced with only minor changes for 19 years. This would cause little comment today, but in the early days of cars when progress moved much faster, it was unprecedented.

Everyone knew the best most efficient way to mass produce anything, was to ignore annual style changes and keep making the same product, with continuous improvements. But only Ford had the guts to stick with it for 19 years.

On the other hand, if something was not working, he would drop it like a hot potato. Take the Peace Ship. He said if he could end the World War at the cost of his entire fortune he would do it and I believe he was sincere. He spent over $400,000 of his own money chartering a ship and filling it with every kind of do gooder from Baptist preachers to single taxers to Socialists. They were to go to Europe as neutrals, from a neutral country (the US) and negotiate an end to the war.

By the time they got to Europe Ford concluded that there was no chance of success. He spent a week or 2 in bed sick with a cold and flu, but got on the first boat for America as soon as he was able and abandoned the whole project.

Not many men could blow off a dream like that, along with several months work and $400,000 but that was the kind of man he was. Not many men can stick with a good idea and keep doing the same thing over and over as long as it works either. The ability to do both is practically unique. I know I have a hard job doing either, but if I could, I would be a lot better off.


----------



## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

carverman said:


> He was definitely a control freak.


I watched Ford's biography last month on PBS' 'American Experience', and seems that you did as well!

Ford was a control freak for sure; he not only spied on the [private] lives of his employees, but also bullied/humiliated/spied on his own son.

As you also mentioned, Ford began attacking the Jews in 'The Dearborn Independent' in 1920, and continued to do so in 91 subsequent editions until the paper closed, hence his public hate campaign had lasted years, and apparently so did his private ones, so I hardly believe that his eventual apology had been genuine; in fact, there might not have been any apologies had he not been sued. My impression from what I have read/watched thus far, is that he most likely died unrepentant of all, except perhaps of the way he had treated his only son.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/interview/henryford-antisemitism/

As for the $5/day salary, it wasn't exactly all about kindness, but about what it had meant for Ford and his company.

He was a visionary & an industrial genius, no doubt about that.

*SpIcEz:* I'll watch the above link when I'll have some time, so thanks for posting it.


----------

