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Founders: #190 Henry Ford and Thomas Edison

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What I learned from reading The Vagabonds: The Story of Henry Ford and Thomas Edison's Ten-Year Road Trip by Jeff Guinn. ---- Founders Notes gives you the ability to tap into the collective knowledge of history's greatest entrepreneurs on demand. Use it to supplement the decisions you make in your work. Get access to Founders Notes here. ---- Ford generally accepted the responsibilities of his celebrity-he'd worked diligently to cultivate it, realizing early on that his personal fame heightened demand for Model Ts.Ford's Model T changed everything. Thanks in great part to Ford's innovative assembly line, Model Ts were mass-produced on a previously unimaginable scale. In competitors factories, it took workers several hours to assemble an individual car. At the Ford plant, a completed Model T rolled off the line every two and a half minutes.Ford continued tinkering with the manufacturing process, aggressively seeking ways to cut production expenses and Model T prices even more. The best example fostered a popular joke that you could buy any color Model T that you liked, so long as the color was black. Few realized that Ford insisted the cars come in that color because black paint dri

[00:00:00] Before Edison left, he had a suggestion. The best part of the California trip had been the drive from Los Angeles to San Diego, free from any demands but their own whims. While Edison didn't enjoy public appearances, he did savor time spent with friends away from the crushing daily concerns at work. Surely Ford and Firestone felt the same. Why not embark on future car trips, picking a general area and route, and then going along as they pleased? They could camp. Perhaps John Burroughs would come along and point [00:00:32] out all sorts of interesting plant life and birds, as had…

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