Henry Ford's Forever Car
1909 AD
1909 1909
83.07W42.26N
SCI

DETROIT, MICHIGAN
	Though Henry Ford is often remembered for his automobiles, the cars he produced were not nearly as noteworthy as the way he produced them.
	Though an inventive man, the idea that made Ford a huge success may not seem so inventive. It was to design a good car, then just keep making the same model forever.
	And the car he designed was the Model T.  It was cheap, simple, rugged, dependable and easy to maintain. It's simplicity meant it was ideal for assembly line production, a process the Ford Motor Company invented and which almost all manufacturing plants use today.  In fact, to keep manufacturing as simple as possible, the Ford Motor Company offered the Model T in just one color.  Ford once said his customers could have any color car they wanted, "as long as it's black."
	Ford first experimented with mass production at his Piquette Avenue plant in Detroit, where he built a 30- to 40-foot assembly line of railroad ties.  The chassis were put on one end and pulled forward with rope at a rate that allowed workmen to assemble each car.
	His later Highland Park and Rouge River plants were devoted to the assembly line concept.  Between 1909 and 1927, 15.7 million Model T cars rolled off the line.  But in 1927 slipping sales forced Ford to reluctantly announce the company would stop making the car he hoped would last forever.  It was replaced by the Model A.
