Henry Ford, 1914
But as a number of executives left Ford, those who remained tended to be loyal to Henry Ford. Edsel Ford sought, and for a time found, an ally in his brother-in-law, Ernest Kanzler, an attorney who had been hired to manage the Ford tractor business. Kanzler had ascended to a vice presidency when Henry Ford determined Kanzler was trying to drive a wedge between him and his son. Kanzler and Edsel Ford agreed Ford was in need of management policy changes. Kanzler's downfall came after he petitioned Henry Ford to discontinue the Model T and replace it with a more modern car. When Edsel Ford returned from a European trip, Kanzler was gone; he'd either been fired or resigned. According to May's biography of Edsel Ford, the son never attempted to challenge his father over Kanzler's departure although he himself had been arguing for a Model T replacement. During his tenure at the top of the company, Ford had a number of his decisions reversed by his father, reversals he is said to have accepted quietly and without complaint.
One area where Edsel Ford's talents were allowed to soar unfettered was automobile design. While the younger Ford enjoyed modest success in persuading his father to revamp the venerable Model T with smoother lines and choice of colors, he wielded considerable influence over the Lincoln cars. When Henry Ford agreed to buy the failing Lincoln Motor Co. in 1922, he saw himself acquiring a canvas for his son's design artistry. Edsel Ford transformed Lincoln into a leading luxury car in a market well populated with fancy models. When the time finally came to replace the Model T, the Model A, introduced in 1927, had an elegant look, thanks to Edsel Ford. The Lincoln Zephyr followed in late 1935 and was regarded as the first successful streamlined car. The Lincoln Continental came in 1939 and was architect Frank Lloyd Wright's choice for most beautiful car of all time. Other designers managed development of the Zephyr and Continental, but Edsel Ford was a supervisor and close collaborator.
Tastes Differed from Father's
Ford's artistic interests revealed themselves again in tastes more sophisticated than his father's. He supported painter Charles Sheeler's studies of the Ford Rouge plant and in the early 1930s financed Diego Rivera's Detroit Institute of Art murals, also centered on the Ford Rouge operations. Ford became an avid art collector and principal benefactor of the Detroit Institute of Arts. His father's collections of Americana spawned Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village.Aviation also caught the fancy of Edsel Ford. He bought the Stout Metal Aircraft Co. to produce the famous Ford trimotor plane. Ford's aircraft division pioneered the establishment of airlines and flew U.S. mail. Ford also mobilized engineers and technicians to develop a conveyor system for mass production of World War II bombers with interchangeable parts.During the 1930s, Henry Ford ignored the advice of his son and enlisted the aid of Harry Bennett and his strong-arm tactics to thwart attempts to unionize Ford plants. Edsel Ford argued in 1937 the company would eventually be forced to recognize a union, and that finally happened in 1941.
The war effort and its pressures are said to have contributed to Ford's early demise at 49. Others hold the main detriment to his health was the stress of running the company and pressure from his father. When Ford had surgery for a stomach ulcer in 1942, doctors discovered rapidly spreading cancer, news they kept from their patient. Later that year, Ford contracted undulant fever from drinking unpasteurized milk from the Ford farms. Despite this widely publicized illness, May asserts in his biography it must have been the cancer that killed Ford in the spring of 1943.
Edsel Ford lent his name, posthumously, to Ford Motor's infamous Edsel models of the late 1950s. Year-long efforts to name the new car line had included polls, contests and suggestions from a poet such as Mongoose Civique, Pastelogram, and Resilient Bullet. Finally, Ford Chairman Ernest Breech suggested "Edsel." Edsel Ford's three sons balked, but the name stuck. Out of touch with the times, the Edsel was a huge failure, mechanically and aesthetically. Naming such a car after a Detroit "car man" known for his design sense and modern thinking was indeed a dubious tribute.