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Pic-A-Day (463) Albert Mach Fine Art - The New Model Ford

Pic-A-Day (463) Albert Mach Fine Art

The New Model Ford

6/1/1927 Ford News, p. 1. "New Ford Car Announced Details Forthcoming Soon"

Henry Ford said:

"The Model T car was a pioneer. There was no conscious public need of motor cars when we first made it. There were few good roads. This car blazed the way for the motor industry & started the movement for good roads everywhere. It is still the pioneer car in many parts of the world which are just beginning to be motorized. But conditions in this country have so greatly changed that further refinement in motor car construction is now desirable & our new model is a recognition of this. Besides the Model T itself another revolutionary element which the Ford Motor Company introduced twenty years ago was the idea of service. Some of the early manufacturers proceeded on the theory that once they had induced a man to buy a car they had him at their mercy; they charged him the highest possible price for necessary replacements. Our company adopted the opposite theory. We believed that when a man bought one of our cars we should keep it running for him as long as we could & at the lowest upkeep cost. That was the origin of Ford Service. The Model T was one of the largest factors in creating the conditions which now make the new model Ford possible. The world-wide influence of the Ford car in the building of good roads & in teaching the people the use & value of mechanical power is conceded. Nowadays everybody runs some kind of motor power but twenty years ago only the adventurous few could be induced to try an automobile. It had a harder time winning public confidence than the airplane has now. The Model T was a great educator in this respect. It had stamina & power. It was the car that ran before there were good roads to run on. It broke down the barriers of distance in rural sections, brought people of these sections closer together & placed education within the reach of everyone. We are still proud of the Model T Ford car. If we were not we could not have continued to manufacture it for so long. With the new Ford we propose to continue in the light-car field which we created on the same basis of quantity production we have always worked, giving high quality, low price, & constant service. We began work on this new model several years ago. In fact, the idea of a new car has been in my mind much longer than that. But the sale of the Model T continued at such a pace that there never seemed to be an opportunity to get the new car started. Even now the business is so brisk that we are up against the proposition of keeping the factory going on one model while we tool up for another. I am glad of this because it will not necessitate a total shutdown. Only a comparatively few men will be out at a time while their departments are being tooled up for the new product. At one time it looked as if 70,000 men might be laid off temporarily but we have now scaled that down to less than 25,000 at a time. The lay-off will be brief because we need the men & we have no time to waste. At present I can only say this about the new model--it has speed, style, flexibility, & control in traffic. There is nothing quite like it in quality & price. The new car will cost more to manufacture but it will be more economical to operate."

Here is a local Ford Model A owned by a friend at our festival a couple of years ago.