Henry Ford is best known as a mass-manufacturer of automobiles. It was Ford who put the nation on wheels, giving the motor car idea practicability when he developed the means to mass-produce and sell it at a price within the means of the average worker. Ford did much the same thing with aviation. Like the early automobiles, the early airplanes found little public acceptance. It was Henry Ford who pioneered the successful adaptation of the basic concept of the airplane and brought aviation and its advantages within the reach of the average citizen. It was his efforts in developing suitable aircraft to serve the public, then building public confidence in their reliability, safety and necessity that put the nation on wings.

Ford himself flew only three times. But just as he believed that everyone should be able to own a car, he was convinced that flying should be within the public's reach. And he recognized a business opportunity.

Ford's first involvement in aviation came in 1909, just six years after the Wright brothers' first powered flight, when he helped his son Edsel and a young Ford employee, Charles Van Auken, build a primitive monoplane powered by a Model T engine. When the First World War required the mass production of airplanes and airplane engines, Ford Motor Co. mass-produced the American-designed Liberty aircraft engine and developed engines for the Kettering Bug, America's first guided missile. After the war Ford became interested in dirigibles and invested in the Airplane Development Division, which pioneered in the development of the world's first metal-clad airship -- the ZMC-2.

In 1923, Edsel Ford invested in the Stout Metal Airplane Company, which built the "Air Pullman," the world's first all-metal, single-engine high cantilever wing monoplane. From this start, with additional help from Ford Motor Company, the all-metal Stout 2-AT "Air Transport" plane was developed. With it, Ford in 1925 initiated Ford Air Transport Service - the world's first regularly scheduled commercial airline which shuttled company freight between Detroit and Chicago.

In January 1925, Henry Ford dedicated Ford Airport at Dearborn, Michigan. It was the first modern airport, boasting the first concrete runway, hangars, dirigible mooring mast, weather station, radio shack for communicating with pilots and terminal facilities for passengers. It also included a restaurant and hotel facilities, plus limousine service to downtown Detroit.

In 1925, Henry Ford formed the Stout Metal Airplane Division of the Ford Motor Company. As a result, the sale of Ford-built all-metal single-engine monoplanes began to the young struggling airmail, express and passenger airlines. The same year, the first experimental Ford Tri-Motor was built. as with his automobile manufacturing, Ford introduced assembly-line construction to aviation with production of the new airplane. In 1926, the first Wright "Whirlwind" engine equipped Ford 4-AT Tri-Motor came onto the market. It represented a tremendous technological advance over existing aircraft and it enabled Ford's new Airplane Manufacturing Division to become the world's largest manufacturer of commercial aircraft. The planes carried 11 passengers in wicker seats.

Airlines quickly abandoned their primitive aircraft capable of only carrying airmail and one or two passengers and flocked to buy the Ford Tri-Motor. They were soon used to establish the first transcontinental air service. Nearly 200 were built by the time production ended in 1933.

Richard Byrd became the first to fly over the North Pole in 1926 in a Fokker plane named "Josephine Ford," in honor of Edsel Ford's daughter. A year later, Charles Lindbergh made his historic flight across the Atlantic Ocean and took Henry Ford up in the "Spirit of St. Louis" in what would be Ford's first flight.

To demonstrate the reliability of airplanes and to promote public confidence in commercial aviation, the Fords sponsored an annual aerial showcase in the late 1920s and early 1930s, called The National Air Tour. Often called the Ford Air Tours, the events helped aviation make the transition from primarily military flight and aerial thrill shows to commercial passenger aviation. The series of Reliability Tours began at Ford Airport and involved numerous aircraft flying several thousand miles with stops at various cities. These tours attracted thousands of spectators and generated public interest in private and commercial aircraft.

Henry Ford and company chief engineer, Bill May standing beside a 2-AT outside the Ford Airport hangar at the 1930 Ford Air Tour.

The finish line at the Ford Airport for the 1930 tour. Two Ford trimotors at left, then right to left, Monocoupe, Great Lakes, Kingbird, Rearwin Ken-Royce. Two Wacos, two Bellancas at right, and in the far row, Goodrich Vega, unidentified low-wing monoplane, three Wacos, two Air Corps 0-2s, three Curtiss Fledglings, a Monocoupe and the Monarch Coffee Ford. The four round objects at right center are platform scales for final weighing of contestants' loads.

Planes and cars made life infinitely more convenient on the one hand and terribly more harrowing on the other. In 1926, Ford introduced the Ford Flying Flivver, an attempt to create a cheap, mass-produced model T of the air. The project didn't take off. Originally powered by a French 3 cylinder Anzani motor and for a short time powered by a 2 cylinder Ford motor, the A2 offered room for the pilot only -- no passengers. Still, the little plane stimulated tremendous popular interest. In 1928, however, the plane crashed and killed its pilot, Harry Brooks, Henry Ford's friend. Following the crash Ford abandoned the idea of making every man a flier and soon lost interest in aviation.

Historian Timothy J. O'Callaghan has recently written a book, The Aviation Legacy of Henry & Edsel Ford, which chronicles the contribution of Henry and Edsel Ford to the story of aviation during a most critical period of its development. The books covers the creation of the famous Ford Tri-Motor, the "Tin Goose", as well as Henry Ford's tiny "Flivver", an airplane for everyman. Other chapters deal with the Ford contribution to the American war efforts and the building of the B-24 Liberator. All of these topics were important milestones on the journey from the stick and fabric planes of World War I to the all-metal commercial airliners and mighty bombers of World War II .

In addition to the book, O'Callaghan has also helped to create brief video, Henry Ford's Aviation Ventures - 1924 -1936, which highlights the Ford involvement in aviation during the Golden Age.

The video offers a glimpse of Ford aviation through the eyes of the Ford motion picture cameramen. In 1914 Henry Ford established a Photographic Department that rivaled the best in the world, allowing Ford cameramen to capture much of the activities of Ford aviation. In 1963 the Ford Motor Company gave the National Archives approximately 1,500,000 feet of this film with additional key footage given to the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village.

This video, which features narration, was complied from silent film, most of which has never been seen by the public. Key footage covers the first flights of Ford planes, aerial views of Ford Airport in Dearborn, Michigan, as well as:

I highly recommend both the book and the video for anyone interested in the early years of American aviation. Both items may be available in your local library. If not, they can be ordered for $34.95 for the book and $23.00 for the video.