Ford Motor Company
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The Ford Motor Company (often known as Ford) is an American company that makes cars. It is named after its the man who made it, Henry Ford.
Ford's first car was made in 1908. It was called a Model T.
These car makers are also owned by Ford:
- Aston Martin
- Jaguar
- Mercury
- Land Rover
- Lincoln
- Volvo and Mazda
In 1896, Henry Ford had an idea to make a Quadricycle. It was the first "horseless carriage" that he built. It was very different from cars we drive now, and even from what he produced a few years later, but in a way it's the starting point of Ford's career as a businessman. Until the Quadricycle, Ford's tinkering had been experimental, theoretical—like the gas engine he built on his kitchen table in the 1890's, which was just an engine with nothing to power. Enoguh people liked the Quadricycle, and much could be done with the Quadricycle, that it started the beginning of Ford's business.
Ford Motor Company went into the business on June 16, 1903, when Henry Ford and 11 business helpers signed the company's beginning papers. The first Ford car, the Model A, was being sold in Detroit, Michigan a few months later. With $28,000 (around 16 000 pounds), the pioneering industrialists made what was to become one of the world's largest companies. Few places like Ford are as said to have shaped the history and development of industry and society in the 20th century as Ford Motor Company.
[change] Mass Production on the Line
Perhaps Ford Motor Company's single greatest contribution to automotive manufacturing was the moving assembly line. First implemented at the Highland Park plant (in Michigan, US) in 1913, the new technique allowed individual workers to stay in one place and perform the same task repeatedly on multiple vehicles that passed by them. The line proved tremendously efficient, helping the company far surpass the production levels of their competitors—and making the vehicles more affordable.
[change] The First Vehicles
Henry Ford insisted that the company's future lay in the production of affordable cars for a mass market. Beginning in 1903, the company began using the first 19 letters of the alphabet to name new cars. In 1908, the Model T was born. 19 years and 15 million Model T's later, Ford Motor Company was a giant industrial complex that spanned the globe. In 1925, Ford Motor Company acquired the Lincoln Motor Company, thus branching out into luxury cars, and in the 1930's, the Mercury division was created to establish a division centered on mid-priced cars. Ford Motor Company was growing.
The 1920s
- Model A
The 1930s
1932 Ford Model B Coup
- Model B
- Ford Rheinland
- Ford V8
- Ford Taunus
The 1950s
- Ford 12M '52 - '62
- Ford 15M '55 - '59
- Ford 17M '57 - '60
The 1960s
- Ford P3
- Ford P4
- Ford P5
- Ford P6
- Ford P7
- Ford Capri
- Ford Transit
The 1970s
- Ford Consul
- Ford Taunus
- Ford Escort
- Ford Fiesta
- Ford Granada
- Ford Capri
The 1980s
Ford RS200
- Ford Capri
- Ford Escort
- Ford Orion
- Ford RS200
- Ford Sierra
- Ford Scorpio
The 1990
- Ford Cougar
- Ford Escort
- Ford Explorer
- Ford Focus (2001 and 2002)
- Ford Galaxy (VW Sharan and Seat Alhambra)
- Ford Ka
- Ford Maverick
- Ford Mondeo
- Ford Probe
- Ford Puma
- Ford Windstar
The 2000s
- Ford Focus C-MAX
- Ford Focus ST
- Ford Fusion
- Ford StreetKa
- Ford Transit Connect
- Ford Tourneo Connect
- Ford S-MAX
- Ford Focus Cabriolet (2006)
- Ford CUV (2007, )
History of Ford's CEO's
