Henry Ford: two closed companies and the impossible engine

Henry Ford became synonymous with the people's car. Ford Motor Company, founded on June 16, 1903, was his third attempt to make a car company work.

The no

The first was the Detroit Automobile Company, opened on August 5, 1899 with money from twelve investors, among them the mayor of Detroit. The cars came out expensive, slow to build and of uneven quality. The company was dissolved in January 1901.

The second was the Henry Ford Company, created in November 1901 with investors drawn by Ford's racing wins. Quarrels between him and the partners started early, and Ford left in 1902. The company he left was reorganized by Henry Leland and became Cadillac.

The third no is the most famous, and it has to be told with care. Napoleon Hill writes in Think and Grow Rich (1937) that Ford asked his engineers for an engine with all eight cylinders cast in a single block, that everyone said it was impossible, and that Ford replied: "Produce it anyway." Hill is a weak source for historical detail, and there's no independent document of the scene. So here it appears as Hill's account.

What they did

With the third company, Ford got it right. In 1908 came the Model T; in 1913, the moving assembly line at Highland Park.

The engine in the anecdote existed too. The Ford V8 reached the streets in 1932, the first mass-produced, affordable V8 with a one-piece block. The difficulty was real: the first blocks cracked in the foundry, and it took months of testing before the part came out whole. The engine stayed in production until 1953.

Two versions that circulate are worth correcting: it wasn't a "four-valve" car, and the story isn't from "seventy years ago". The 1932 V8 had sixteen valves, and the launch was more than nine decades ago.

What this has to do with Bairo

Bairo Leandro Gonzalez Martinez also had companies that didn't work out before the one that did. He tells how he lost his place in his own business when his partners pushed him out, just as Ford left the company that bore his name. And he tells how, after a business that didn't hold up, he decided to do precisely what he didn't know how to do.

The tribute isn't about size. It's about method: hearing "it can't be done" and treating the phrase as a starting point. In Bairo's story, this has a name, no is the foundation of yes, and a number, the seventh attempt.

The V8 episode opens Bairo's story in the chapter Fifty-five years later.

Sources

• Detroit Automobile Company (1899–1901): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Automobile_Company
• Henry Ford Company (1901–1902): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ford_Company
• Ford Motor Company, official biography of Henry Ford: https://corporate.ford.com/articles/history/henry-ford-biography/
• Ford flathead V8 (1932–1953): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_flathead_V8_engine
• Hagerty, "Ford's flathead V-8 gave power to the people": https://www.hagerty.com/media/automotive-history/fords-flathead-v-8-gave-power-to-the-people/
• Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich (1937): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_and_Grow_Rich
• On Hill's credibility: https://paleofuture.com/blog/2016/12/6/the-untold-story-of-napoleon-hill-the-greatest-self-help-scammer-of-all-time