River Rouge: Ford's Industrial Colossus

Rating:
Summary: Great historical photography, a good general Ford history
Review: The book chronicles the history of the River Rouge plant beginning over 80 years ago to the present. A highlight is the large number of historical photographs, showing buildings, machinery, and workers over the years. As written the book functions more as a general history of Ford with the Rouge as the backdrop, especially the first half of the book. The second half of the book, dealing with the 1960's forward, has more of a focus on the Rouge itself.

The author does particularly well with certain topics, including union organization activities of the 1930's-1940's and the opening of the new Dearborn Truck Plant. Also the author employs many one to two-page sidebars on specific subtopics, such as "Sailing Aboard the Ford Fleet", "Bomber Plant Captivates America", "Last Ford Train to Nowhere", and "Death of the Rotunda". Several of these subtopics cover obscure subject matter and I found them particularly interesting.

Other books do a better job with the history of Ford (for example Brinkley's "Wheels for the World"), and I was perhaps expecting more focus on the plant per se (how the machines function, workers' experiences). Still the book is a worthy addition to the collection of any Ford or industrial history fan.

Rating:
Summary: Keep the pages in proper order !
Review: The history is excellent but the reading is difficult due to some pages not being in sequential order. Once you get the hang as to where the story continues, you're fine but it is frustrating. The photos are super some of which I have not seen before. Histoically sound. However, I did notice an error or two but certain they were clerical in nature. Overall a good buy for a Ford Nut.