THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Dr. David Lewis' Ford Biography Details
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Manufacturer's Genius and Anti-Semitism
Of the many biographies
of Henry Ford that were
published in the last three
decades, none matches in
throughness the new work
by Dr. David L. Lewis, pro-
fessor of business history in
the Graduate School of
Business Administration at
the University of Michigan.
, Dr. Lewis' "The Public
age of Henry Ford: An
Mili rmerican Folk Hero and
His Company" (Wayne
State University Press) is so
all-inclusive that it has al-
ready been hailed as a clas-
c.
Ild'For
Wayne State Univer-
-c.
Press the Lewis work
marks a publishing achieve-
ment, and the prediction in
advance literary evaluations
is that it will be a best
seller.
It is the thoroughness of
this work that elevates it
to a place among the great -
biographical works of the
decade. As the title indi-
cates, Dr. Lewis devoted
his research to a study of
company policies as well
as the Ford ethics and so-
cial atitudes.
The elder Ford's anti-
Semitism is subjected to
scrutiny and all the factors
in the automobile manufac-
turer's prejudices are given
in microscopic treatment.
Prof. Lewis had served on
the staffs of Ford Motor Co.
and General Motors Corp.
before joining the Univer-
sity of Michigan faculty.
His knowledge of automo-
bile manufacturing is there-
fore based on deep knowl-
edge which was especially
applied in the case of Henry
Ford and his company as re-
lated in the new biography
which will be released by
the WSU Press on July 30.
Allan Nevins, himself a
noted biographer and histo-
rian of the Ford era, com-
menting on Dr. Lewis' book
stated:
-
"This is a model book of
its kind. It is the best
HENRY FORD
study in industrial public notes, casts a long shadow.
relations I have ever read. His anti-Semitism, and the
Not only is it throughly reaction to it, continues to
scholarly, and marked shape his company's rela-
by incisive judgment tions with American Jewry,
throughout; it is so well- Israel, and the Arab world.
written and so colorful His views on the healthful
that it will hold the atten- effects of exercise and ill
tion of the general reader effects of cigarette smoking
while it satisfies the spe- and his employment of
cial student of business blacks, the physically hand-
history and public opinion. icapped, and ex-convicts
It offers a mine of new ma- were decades ahead of his
terials. . ."
time.
Dr. Lewis's book is both a
His passion for soybeans
biography of Henry Ford inspired countless farmers
and a public relations and to grow the crop; his plastics
advertising history of the experimentation presaged
Ford Motor Co.
large-scale chemurgic re-
Old Henry, as the book search.
Ford Calls Agnew Statements
Substantively, Morally Wrong
Chicago's Rabbis
Fight Racial Strife
CHICAGO (JTA) — The
NEW YORK — President to the future and to deter- Chicago Board of Rabbis
Ford has called Spiro Ag- mine ways we can reduce bi- has proposed a three-point
new's recent remarks ma- gotry in the world and se- program to end racial dis-
ligning Israel, Zionists and cure a just and lasting turbances and called for the
American Jews "wrong, peace. Your organization creation of dialogues aimed
both substantively and mor- has alwlys been in the fore- a racial amity.
"Outbreaks of racial vol-
ally."
front of the effort, and I
In a letter to Seymour want to do everything I can ence on the Southwest Side
Graubard, national chair- as President to ensure that, of our city and in other
man of the Anti-Defama- working together, we can be areas are a source of pain
and anguish to all," espe-
tion League of Bnai Brith, successful"
the President said: ". . .
Graubard noted criticism cially during the year of
they struck as an unsavory of the Agnew statements re- America's bicentennial cele-
footnote to a chapter in our ceived by the agency from bration, the Board of Rabbis
history that would best re- Jimmy Carter, Gov. Ed- said.
It called for the following
main closed."
mund G. Brown, Jr., Sen.
President Ford said "In- Henry M. Jackson and Sen. action: "Law enforcement
stead of dwelling upon the Frank Church as well as agencies should stringently
enforce a court injunction
past, I would prefer to look Ford.
restraining the provocation
by the Nazi Party in our
Yadin Says Gonen Should Be city;
Black and white offi-
cers should patrol troubled
Cited For Contempt of Court
areas together to symbolize
the racial cooperation that
JERUSALEM (JTA)
pur War and the conduct of is possible and is indeed pre-
Yigael Yadin said the war in its initial stages. sent in our community;
3dnesday that Res. Gen. Gonen, who was com- groups such as the Confer-
muel Gonen should be mander of the Sinai front ence on Race and Religion,
ed for contempt of court when the -Egyptians the Leadership Council for
because of his recent public launched their surprise at- Metropolitan Open Housing
criticism of the findings of tack, was held responsible and other groups of good
Agranat Committee. for Israel's early set-backs, will should once again
adin, an internationally according to the Agranat create conditions for dia-
famous archaeologist and Committee's findings. He logue which will help people
former chief of staff who re- subsequently resigned from of all races to understand
cently entered the political active duty but vowed to the dangers of racial hatred
arena, told Hebrew Univer- clear his name.
and the possibility for racial
sity students that Gonen
amity."
should be tried for making
Last week he attacked the
The Board of Rabbis
disclosures about his committee, specifically Ya- noted "that groups which
Agranat Committee testi- din and another of its mem- have been historically anti-
mony. All witnesses who bers, former Chief of Staff Semitic are now fomenting
appeared before the panel Haim Laskov, who he ac- hatred of Black people. As a
were under oath not to dis- cused of covering up for De- result of these actions, the
cuss their testimony in pub- fense Minister Moshe possibilities of open racial
lic, Yadin said.
Dayan. He also claimed that warfare has become a
Yadin was a member of Yadin and Laskov were not threat to the very fiber of
the committee established up-to-date in their military our society. In our bicenten-
in 1973 by Premier Golda knowledge and had no un- nial year, this threat must
Meir to investigate events derstanding of the dynam- be met and people of good
leading up to the Yom Kip- ics of the Yom Kippur War. will must prevail."
Friday, July 2, 1976 17
ZOA Israel Youth
Camp Program Up
MICHAEL KAPLIT
Photography
Weddings • Bar Mitzvas
NEW YORI — Nearly 200
642-1039
young Americans departed
for Israel in the latter half
of June on one of the three
Israel summer youth pro-
grams of the Zionist Organi-
zation of America. This rep-
resents a 50 percent
increase over ZOA spon-
sored youth travel to Israel
last summer.
Ford's popularity and
influence grew out of a
myriad of activities and a
torrent of publicity, much
of it self-generated. Thus
Lewis's book devles into
every corner of the mag-
nate's life.
The foundation stones of
Ford's reputation — his rac-
ing triumphs, battles
against monopolists and
Wall Streeters, five-dollar-
a-day wage, "peace ship,"
World War I grandstanding,
the Model T, pricecutting,
moving assembly lines —
are fully discussed.
So are Ford's numerous
extracurricular activities
including flyers into the
railroad, tractor, and avia-
tion industries, experimen-
tation with plastics, rubber-
growing and tiny hydroelec-
tric plants, construction of
Henry Ford Hospital and
Greenfield Village and res-
toration of old inns, cru-
sades for old-fashioned
dancing, bird conservation,
and health fads, and forays
against jazz, rolled stock-
ings, scarlet fiction, cheap
movies, and liquor.
Publicity arising from
these and other Fordian ac-
tivities and pronouncements
led the poor, blacks, and
small-town people, espe-
cially, to love the industrial-
ist and the intelligentsia,
unionists, and New Dealers
to dislike or despise him.
Dr. Lewis's book, 19
years in preparation and
based on primary research
in the Henry Ford Mu-
seum's Ford Archives,
captures the lights and
shadows of one of the 20th
Century's most elusive fig-
ures. It is one of the few
Ford biographies which
casts the manufacturer as
neither saint nor villain.
The most lengthy single
volume written on Ford, the
book, with more than 1,328
footnotes citing thousands
of sources, is more thor-
oughly documented and in-
dexed than any other Ford
book. It has more than 100
pictures on the automaker
and the sources of his pub-
licity.
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