10. Henry Ford and the automobile
Henry Ford did not invent the automobile, nor the assembly line, nor the use of interchangeable parts in manufacturing of products. The question of who did invent the automobile is one which is answered with several different names, depending on the opinion of the person to whom the question is addressed. But if one uses the issuance of a patent as the standard of measurement for the question the answer is clear. The first American to be awarded an automobile patent was Oliver Evans. He was also the first to patent the continuous production line used for manufacturing, in 1784. Evans designed mills in which the transition of grain into flour was both continuous and automatic, powered by steam or water.
Ford’s greatest innovation, one for which there was no patent but which changed the world forever, was making the automobile affordable, and paying wages which allowed his employees greater purchasing power. Like Evans before him, the first vehicles he built were powered by steam, which Ford came to consider dangerous due to the risk of boiler explosions. Evans had built a massive steam-powered vehicle in 1805 that Ford considered in his designs, before deciding that steam was an unsuitable source of automotive power. When Ford introduced his Model T in 1908, one of the features of the car was its steering wheel being on the left, which other manufacturers in America quickly copied.