March 1916, “with Mr. Ford’s compliments,”
local Ford agent Hill & Company presented a Model T
touring car to Thomas Edison. The value of the vehicle was $480. In 1922,
Ford and Edison traveled to downtown Fort Myers in the car, stopping at Hill and
Company to talk with Hill and shake hands with his employees. Edison referred to
such jaunts as “motor rides.”
This “Southern Trade” Model T has a sixty
inch wide tread, rather than the standard fifty six inch tread. The wider tread
was designed so the cars’ wheels would fit into existing wagon ruts on the rough
roads that were often the norm in small southern towns like Fort Myers. Edison’s
friend Harvey Firestone updated the original wooden wheels with balloon tyres in
1924. This car is still in full running condition.
Thomas Edison and his Model
T
Henry Ford said of the Model T, “I will
make a motor car for the great multitude.” Indeed, Ford’s perfection of the
assembly line made mass production of the Model T possible. In turn, production
costs were significantly lowered and the average person could now afford to own
one. Henry Ford never said “I don’t mind what colour it is so long as it’s
black.” Just like Michael Caine has never said in any film “Not a lotta people
know that.”
The Model T featured several innovations.
Vanadium steel lightened the car’s weight. The crank-started car was propelled
by a four-cylinder, twenty horsepower engine. Because of the engine’s
ground-breaking design, the Model T did not require frequent stops for oil. In
addition, a unique planetary transmission created a slight forward movement when
idling, which earned the Model T the affectionate nickname “the family
horse.”
The Model T quickly became the subject of
American folklore, including songs, jokes, limericks and vaudeville routines.
The following parody of Rudyard Kipling’s “Gunga Din” was even used by Ford
dealers in advertising.
Yes, Tin, Tin, Tin,
You exasperating puzzle, Hunka
Tin,
I’ve abused you and I’ve flayed
you,
But, by Henry Ford who made
you,
You are better than a Packard, Hunka
Tin.
The Model T “Chuckwagon”. The three large drawers are made out of Model
T floorboards and have a slide out table for food preparation. To make room for
the table and drawers, the battery, originally located behind the back seat on
the driver’s side, was moved to a specially designed battery box on the running
board. Another unique feature is the water faucet located along the vehicle’s
right side. Ford converted two Model T gas tanks into storage containers to hold
fresh water.
The original tyres were thirty inch wooden
wheels and were replaced around 1926 with twenty one inch rubber tyres
reinforced with wire. This allowed for a smoother ride. By 1931, the vehicle was
owned by Greenfield Village, now part of the Henry Ford Museum complex in
Dearborn, Michigan. In the 1980’s it was sold to a private collector and was
acquired by the Edison and Ford Winter Estates in 1997. Restoration was
completed in 2010. The original RV.
Almost a hundred years ago, Thomas
Edison and his good friend Henry Ford began a ten year exploration of America
utilising Ford’s new automobiles. In 1914 Edison, Ford, John Burroughs, and
assorted family members assembled their Ford motor cars and embarked on a camping and exploratory trip of the Florida
Everglades. It would begin a decade of exploration of America by the
self-proclaimed ‘Vagabonds’ and
the beginning of an unprecedented era of recreational travel that would
transform America.
Edison, Ford, and
Burroughs with family and friends on a camping trip in the Florida
Everglades.
Edison had purchased riverside property in Fort
Myers in 1885 and created a tropical retreat for himself, his
family, friends and professional colleagues. By 1914 he was ready to explore
Florida and to engage his colleague Henry Ford with his automobiles in the
project.
In the winter of 1914, the respected
American Naturalist, John
Burroughs and automobile magnate Ford arrived in Fort Myers to much
fanfare and excitement to visit Edison. At the time Burroughs, the author of
dozens of nature essay collections, enjoyed immense national popularity. Ford was at the height of his fame,
having produced his self-coined “motor car for the multitude,” and instituted
the previously unheard of - five dollar per day pay rate and eight hour
workday.
Burroughs marveled at the exotic subtropical plants and birds of
the Caloosahatchee River region, noting how much the area reminded him of
Honolulu and Jamaica. Ford always looked forward to spending time away from his
busy industry with his mentor and hero, Thomas Edison. Although we don’t know
exactly how the idea for their first
camping journey into Florida’s wild country came about, it seems likely
that Edison saw the trip as an adventure and opportunity to share his beloved
Eden with his friends.
However the idea materialised, the three famous men journeyed into the
Everglades and investigated the flora and fauna of the Big Cypress area.
Roughing it off-road in the Florida interior gave the men a taste for discovery.
As a result, they, along with tire industrialist Harvey Firestone, embarked on a series of camping trips through the eastern
United States.
For the next ten years, the “Vagabonds”
and their guests explored America their way. They experienced the growing nation
and its resources, as well as the interests of the American public, first-hand.
They also engaged in tree chopping
contests, entertained curious onlookers, motored off-road and enjoyed time away
from their busy lives. Yet the camping trips merit a deeper significance when
observed against the backdrop of a
period of tremendous political, technological and industrial
change.
According to Harvey Firestone’s
reminiscences, each of the famous
campers had a pre-described role in the trips. Edison arranged a storage battery set-up to light the camps and
provide electricity. He also led late-night fireside discussions about
politics, philosophy and current events that became the hallmark of the trips.
Firestone made sure the vehicles were
loaded with provisions and hired the cooks.
Ford scouted out potential camping areas,
often taking a swim in nearby
waters, climbing trees, chopping wood with gusto, organising
contests for entertainment (rifle
shooting, high kicking and sprinting) as well as the role of caravan mechanic. Ford had two Model T trucks outfitted with drinking
water tanks and work tables for the cooks.
John
Burroughs was the philosopher
and nature-lover on the trips. A good deal older than the other campers,
he enjoyed the role of instructor, taught bird calls, shared his
knowledge of botany and led
nature
walks.
Over the decade in which the trips took
place, they evolved from relaxing
getaways to heavily promoted events that included numerous publicity
stops covered by the press and the Ford Motor Company’s newsreel cameras.
Historians often note that Edison’s greatest
invention did not garner one of his famous 1093 patents; it was his propensity for self-promotion that
may have been his utmost genius.
Similarly, Ford capitalised on his image as an “everyman” by using the camping trips as a means to
promote the joys of recreational motoring, in turn, selling more Model
T’s. It is no coincidence that tin-can
tourism became the national rage at the same time that the “Vagabonds”
highly-publicised camping trips took place.
The fact that two sitting United States
Presidents, Warren Harding and Calvin
Coolidge made appearances during the camping trips, illustrating the
influence that Edison, Ford and Firestone wielded not
just in business, but in politics.
Interestingly, the “Vagabonds” could not have chosen a more eventful decade
to embark on their camping adventures. World War I ushered out the
innocent turn-of-the-century era and heralded in the Roaring Twenties, a time
that social, technological and communication developments reached new heights.
From 1914 to 1924 the world experienced
intense change, much of it wrought by the giants at the centre of the camping
trips. The affordability of the
automobile, due to Ford’s assembly line production, changed America from
an agrarian to an urban nation in a relatively short
period.
Edison’s legacy was perhaps even more
apparent by this time. The accessibility of electrical power in
the 1910’s and early 1920’s increased intensely, and changed the way in which
people lived, worked, traveled and communicated.
Edison, Ford and Firestone were keenly aware of the role of politics and
international affairs in their business success. It seems likely that
their earliest discussions on the quandary of rubber availability may
have occurred near the campfire, leading them to the incorporation of the Edison Botanic Research Corporation (1927),
headquartered in Fort Myers, Florida, with a goal of raising and
producing an organic source of rubber
in the United States thus relieving the nation’s dependence on foreign
rubber.
The colourful outdoor adventures of the
famous friends spanned more than a decade of American history and captured the
imagination and attention of the public. The Vagabonds’ camping trips amounted
to much more than a group of famous men
cavorting across the countryside enjoying time away from it all; the trips were an adventure into a rapidly
changing America, a venue for self-promotion and political influence, as
well as a means of exploration and discovery in the midst of a time of great
international change.
ALL IN ALL GREAT FRIENDS WHO MADE
JOBS FOR MILLIONS
.
