Customer Reviews

Fordlandia

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This book offers a rare and fascinating look into Henry Ford's grand economic experiment in the Amazon jungle.

In 1927, approaching his 65th birthday, Ford sent his first two ships to the area. He had purchased 2.5 million acres of Amazon land - roughly the size of Connecticut. He planned not only to plant rubber trees, but also to mine the land for gold; drill for oil; and harvest timber. In addition, he hoped to bring his American-style sensibilities to the region: the production line; sanitation; buildings such as Churches, cottages; a hospital; a movie theater; and the idea of fair wages for hard work. What he didn't bring was a an expertise in growing rubber trees, or an understanding of the Amazon and it's people.

One other thing Ford never brought to Fordlandia was himself. Between the inception of Fordlandia in 1927 and Ford's death in 1947, he never set foot in the Amazon.

This is the story of the creation of "Fordlandia", amazing in itself. But, it is also the story of Henry Ford (a man of sharp contradictions); the struggles of the American and Brazilian laborers who worked in the City; and of the Amazon. It also speaks of a different era, when seemingly impossible things could be attempted.

Very well written and researched. Lots of old photographs. I can find no flaws. Highly recommended.

One of the best books I have read on Henry Ford, and I've read most all of them. The author provides a fascinating rendition of so many topics, including the Amazon, Diego Rivera's Detroit murals, the booming 1920s and the hard times of the 1930s. The book is epic in scope, a really wonderful journey that takes readers from Detroit to the wilds of northern Michigan, the Tennessee River Valley (I didn't know that the idea for the TVA came from Ford!) and then to the Amazon. I fully recommend this book.

Fordlandia is that rare non-fiction written by an historian that is a great read. Author Greg Grandin takes the reader on a wonderful voyage down the Amazon as he uncovers a magical mystery escapade of Henry Ford. Not unlike many of the recent forays into Southeast Asia and the Middle East, Ford's desire to claim the hearts, minds and raw materials of Latin America, specically Brazil seem very modern and familiar. He seems to have made all the classic errors of neo-colonism: ignoring the host culture, trying to impose an inappropriate culture and economic system, sending personnel not schooled in the language or culture.

On top of this, the Amazon was an unfriendly climate for those used to the cold winds of Michigan and the Puritan work ethic of the United States. Insects, diseases, "indolent" workers, lack of modern conveniences and the very essence of the area combined to doom Ford's dream of establlishing a town/plantation devoted to cornering the market on rubber.

Ford's efforts to transplant his River Rouge auto plant to the jungle of Brazil makes for fascinating and thought provoking reading.

Henry Ford, a man who had successfully developed the industrial technique which would raise the living standards of America and much of the world, tried to create his own "rubber state" in the depths of the Brazilian jungle (they call it a "rain forest now, for PR purposes). Having gotten his hands on iron mines for steel, forests for lumber and copper mines for wiring "Fordlandia" was an attempt by Ford to get access to the one material still out of his reach: rubber.

At the time, rubber was mostly coming from European colonies in Asia. Attempts to grow it in Florida were not very successful so Ford looked to Brazil, where rubber-bearing plants originated from. The Ford company convinced the state and federal governments to give him a stretch of territory the size of Connecticut for the purposes of growing rubber trees. Ford spent millions of dollars on Fordlandia, creating a small American town in the wilderness, complete with swimming pools, a modern hospital, a powerplant, sawmill, etc.

However, Ford had a habit of forming opinions and then not listening to experts. His efforts to grow rubber were doomed because rubber plants in Brazil are subject to a host of diseases and pests (rubber plants in Asia do not have this problem) which makes large-scale, industrial collection of rubber impractical.

The book is well-written, discussing Henry Ford's eccentric ideas and the experiences of many of his employees who were involved in Fordlandia. The research is first-rate. However, the book does diverge significantly from the subject at hand, comparing Ford's attempts to conquer the Brazilian jungle to the War in Iraq (!!!) and devoting several unfortunate pages to a rant about capitalism, global warming and globalism. Otherwise it would rate full five stars.

It is seldom that I enjoy reading this type of history just for the sheer entertainment and of course the history lessons it offers. This isn't the first book about Henry Ford's South American adventure and attempt to corner the world market for rubber, and I can't say that I have read all the others so I can't offer a comparison, in fact it has been only a dozen years or so since the last one, and that too was titled "Fordlandia." but I believe that was a fictionalized account.

After the unimaginable success of Ford's Model T, and in the '30s he is the wealthiest man in the world, Henry Ford is launching The Model A, and this time he is offering several more color options than black. He has also aquired Lincoln Motors and entered into the luxury car market, so with his son Edsel they embark on a plan to build a city, complete with golf courses and other amenities of civilization to lure workers to his new utopia carved out of the wilderness. It is truly an amazing story of big business, greed, hubris and even anti-semitism. The writing is sometimes rough, and uneven, but the immense amount of research Grandin has done is evident, and the original photos included and spread throughout the text increase the pleasure of reading this volume..

Being a Detroiter whose grandfather and mother who worked at the Rouge, and who worked in the Iron Foundry and on the trains beneath the Rouge, who later in life researched Ford's schools in the US, who studied with great care the relationship between the Fords and the workers, I thought I knew Ford. I did not. In this brilliant and carefully documented (read the footnotes for sure) study of not just Fordlandia, but the social relations people form in their struggle with nature in order to create life, means of production, knowledge, and freedom, the author investigates one form of capitalism that mostly likely Ford and others believed would create abundance, hence equality and harmony. How that worked out is done in well written detail in this wonderful book that I am urging everyone to read as we witness other Fordlandias growing---as nations under fire.

I was looking forward to reading this book, especially since it was on a subject that I knew next to nothing about. The book goes into intimate detail on every aspect of Fordlandia, its preparations, the list of characters, etc.
Unfortunately, I had to put the book down after reading about 200 pages. I felt like I was back in college, trying to cram for exam the next morning. The writing style was very "scholastic", and was very difficult for me to get into a groove.
I have nothing bad to say about the research behind this book, just warning anyone that is looking for a book with a more casual writing style.

This is an outstanding book that's hitting the shelves at the perfect time. It represents the best of narrative non-fiction: compelling literature but also sophisticated history. More important, it helps us think about the present in new ways. Tracing the bumbling, avaricious, but well-meaning misadventures of Henry Ford in the Amazon casts light on the troubled reconstruction efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Shifting through the ruins of Ford's grand adventure to produce rubber from the rain forest also provides startling insights into the current collapse of the auto industry. This is history that you will enjoy reading but that will also help you understand how the world works and how it came to be.

Henry Ford liked to boast that he didn't employ experts, because experts always know "why something cannot be done." "We have most unfortunately found it necessary to get rid of a man as soon as he thinks himself an expert - because no one ever considers himself expert if he really knows his job" (pgs 147-148). Most of that was just talk, but Ford certainly had good luck taking competent people and giving them the opportunity to shine. But when it came to Fordlandia, he should have consulted more experts.

Fearing that a European rubber cartel could threaten his manufacturing processes, Ford sought to control his own supply. He settled upon establishing his own plantation along the Amazon instead of Africa because of a friendlier business climate. The vast rubber plantations in Southeast Asia came from seeds smuggled out of Brazil so the logic was that the trees would thrive best in the land where they were native. Also, frustrated in his attempts to establish a type of utopian community in the US, he wanted to show that his ideas would work and bring prosperity to a downtrodden people in the jungle.

But he never consulted any experts, or at least people properly familiar with cultivating rubber trees. The natural fungi and pests which kept rubber trees in check in the Amazon didn't exist in Asia, so plantations there were possible and highly profitable. Also, the people of the Amazon didn't adapt well to the regimented assembly line style of work that had served Ford so well in the United States - there simply wasn't the same kind of economy or the same culture. Furthermore, Ford insisted on creating his own view of civilized society in Fordlandia, including the same style of homes and buildings which were often highly impractical, and sometimes with dangerous consequences.

Having lived in Brazil for a couple of years when I was younger, I was interested in reading about this chapter in it's history. Mr. Grandin presents not only the history of Ford in Brazil and Michigan, but the context of what was happening in the bigger world. His narrative also encompasses lots of relevant peripheral information as well, and all told in a very interesting manner that adds to the story rather than detracting from it. The only negative was the sense that things weren't always told in a chronological order, which was a little confusing. There also seems to be a bit of a sneering attitude toward a lot of Ford's well-intentioned but misguided philosophies, and he seems to blame Ford (at least in part) for the sad state of the Amazon now (deforestation, poverty, etc.) which seemed rather unfair. But it was still an excellent history and loaded with lots of b&w photos and my complaints are minor. I really enjoyed this book and it seems an excellent choice for business classes to illustrate many of the mistakes corporations often make. (Another good book on the rubber trade, although dealing with European excess and brutality in Africa at an earlier time, is King Leopold's Ghost).

Fordlandia was Henry Ford's attempt to build a midwestern style town and a rubber plantation in the Amazon, beginning in the 1920s. Neither the town nor the rubber plantation was successful. It's the outrageousness of the project and the idea that anyone ever thought it would succeed that make the story. Just look at the cover illustration on the book for a flavor of the bizarre juxtaposition of midwestern life with the Amazonian jungle.

Ford's interests in human engineering motivate the project. It's not a simple story of industrial empire gone awry (although it is that, too) -- Ford was as much interested in human engineering as in mechanical engineering and production. His world was one of production and useful consumption, wholesome living, and old-fashioned community -- an idealized midwestern lifestyle. Ford had a history of trying to create that world, in various projects in Michigan and in a proposal similar to the government's Tennessee Valley Authority project. Ford found a blank canvas and willing government in Brazil, along the Tapajos River.

The story is engrossing. As a rubber plantation, Fordlandia had only modest success, much too late in the history of rubber production to be sustainable, as synthetics and new growing techniques had by then made the project unviable. Ford's plan, for which he disdained agricultural experts until late in the game, was to bring plantation-style rubber production to Brazil, where previously rubber had been grown only naturally, with trees spread sparsely among other Amazonian trees and undergrowth. Rubber plantations had succeeded elsewhere in the world, with seeds smuggled out of Brazil. But those places lacked the natural predators of rubber trees, especially leaf blight. When trees were planted close together in Brazil, leaf blight and other predators spread quickly from tree to tree, destroying the crop.

Ford the human engineer made mistakes as well. He sought to bring his enlightened "5 dollar day" wage to Brazil, where, in fact, the native population of the Amazon had little use for cash at all, 5 dollars, 1 dollar, or 200 dollars. His community meals from an ideologically inspired menu (and of poor quality besides) provoked a riot. He did succeed in building what became a kind of oasis of comfort in the jungle, with roads, bizarrely American housing, and some community institutions (church, movies, square dancing!). Some of the houses in Fordlandia are still occupied, although the rubber plantation is long gone, and most of the land has been converted to pasture.

What is most interesting to me in the story is Ford's attitude that, underneath the Amazonian culture, or any culture, people are the same. And there is a style of life that is best for all people -- this idealized midwestern lifestyle of production and useful consumption, wholesomeness, and community. If you just remove the impediments, that's how human beings will live -- impediments that include intrusive government and social vices like drinking, gambling, etc. His failing as a human engineer was to undervalue difference, how different "different" really can be. The Amazon had a style of life, failing in many ways at the time Ford's project began, but a style nonetheless with a history of its own. It wasn't just waiting to be rescued by Ford's vision of how life should be.