Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil
Yep, went back and did my history lesson. Tudor then Phaeton body, my bad. Wonder what happened to the one Will Rogers got?
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Phil:
This won't tell what happened to the one Will Rogers got but it's a nice "overview" of what Will Rogers thought about Henry Ford:
Will Rogers on Henry Ford and the Automobile
(comments made before 1935)
"There is more money invested in garages than in schools and churches. 98.5% of the building permits in small towns are for filling stations. Over two-thirds of the unemployed in this country are working in filling stations. If people slept in filling stations instead of just driving by them, it would solve the housing problem of this country.
"There are 300,000 men just pumping gas into cars every minute of the day in America alone...193,000 just fixing punctures...800,000 just looking on, with 750,000 of 'em offering advice - .009% successfully...[There's]187,000 people every minute of the day just cranking the old ones [Model Ts and Model As], 81 with results. There is 43,000 just holding up the hoods of Fords looking at them, 42,598 with the same expression.
"[Henry] Ford made a car that runs with your feet instead of your head and hands. He was smart enough to know more people knew how to use their feet than they do their head or hands. He has made more business for an undertaker than any other one thing, with the exception of Prohibition. Monday moprning after a beautiful sunshiny Sunday finds the undertaker singing at his work.
"He has caused more people to go into debt than for rent or food. He has drove more states, counties, towns, and federal governments into debt than the World War. We owe more for roads than we did to persuade the Germans to 'Please leave Belgium.' Had we no good roads, we would miss all the scandal in the Highway Department. No state ever worries about who will be governor - it's who will be on the highway commission? I care not who writes a nation's songs: give me the highway contracts to deal out and I will show you what hard work, perseverances and taking advantage of your opportunities will do. He has given us our second biggest problem we have today, namely: 'After it's parked (and you come back and get it), how am I going to get home in it through the traffic?' That's why so many people leave 'em parked.
Great educators try to teach poeople, preachers try to change people, but no man produced through the accepted channels has moved the world like Henry Ford. He put wheels on our homes - a man's castle is his sedan; life's greatest catastrophe is a puncture. Americans don't fear the Lord as much as they do the next payment. Everybody is rushing to get somewhere where they have no business being, so they can hurry back again to the place they should never have left. "So good luck, Mr. Ford. It will take a hundred years to tell whether you have helped us or hurt us, but you certainly didn't leave us like you found us."
In fact Will Rogers actually nominated Henry Ford for President on May 31, 1923 in New York City. He said Democrats are the middle of the road party, Republicans are the straddle the road party and dubbed Henry Ford as head of what he called the "All Over The Road" party; his speech said Mr. Ford should win the election since he already carries 2/3rd of the American public and concluded with the remark, "There's no reason there shouldn't be a Ford in the White House, they're everywhere else." Here's the actual 2 minute speech you can listen to from the History Channel:
http://www.history.com/speeches/will...-for-president