Ford marks 100th birthday of the Model T

The Model T, nicknamed the “Tin Lizzie,” was probably the most important vehicle in causing social change in America, Heitmann said. It helped transform the nation’s cities, enabling residents to move farther away from the trolley lines and creating the first ring of suburbs, he said.

“The move out of the city began with the Model T and other vehicles, particularly after World War I,” he said.

Heitmann said the Model T also was embraced by farmers and rural Americans.

“It had a very high ground clearance. It was easy to repair. It was so inexpensive that isolation on the American farm came to an end,” he said.

Once rural Americans used the Model T to come to the cities to shop, crossroads stores in the country went out of business and centralized school systems replaced one-room schoolhouses, Heitmann said.

Henry Ford and the Model T also changed the face of the U.S. labor force.

Heitmann said Ford raised wages to attract and keep workers at his factories and employed immigrants and minorities.

“That was really important in kind of creating a class of well-to-do workers,” he said.

The popularity of the Model T also found its way into poems, songs and movies.

But while the Model T was popular and offered an affordable car to the masses, Henry Ford may have tried to ride it a little too long, said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich. Cole said consumers came to expect more upscale models with a wider variety of colors.

“He innovated. He brought this into the market,” Cole said of Ford. “Then he got hit by others who innovated.”

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