1910 - 1920 The Model A

We're all familiar with the Ford Motor Company. Famously known for it's powerful muscle cars such as the Ford Mustang and the trucks such as Ford F-150. But, we're going to take it back a little, like, around 100 years back to 1913, when designer Henry Ford produced the Ford car, the Ford Model A.

Henry Ford had a reason for designing this car, he said "I will build a car for the great multitude." Simply put, he invented the automotive technology in a way that the common person would be able to afford it. Until his time, inventors such as Rudolf Diesel and Nikolai Tesla had already patented different kinds of motors. Henry Ford based his ideas off of these past works to create the 4 flat L cylinder engine for his Model A. The motor required a hand crank in substitution to modern times car batteries. The car’s transmission was automatic and had 3 gears. The body design was a 4 person cabin. Depending on what model you buyed, the car would cost 385$ to 1400$. Higher end cars would have better interior finishing and attracting features such as heating and rear view mirrors . The car also included 4 wheel drum brakes (not as effective as our modern disk brakes mind you). This was a great affordable car for the common people.

    In Henry Ford's time, the way to get around was by horse carriages. By developing the Motor of the Model A, the car could give the user 40 horsepower and a top speed of 65 mph. However, this invention did have it’s limitations. The car was not very popular due to other cars it was competing with it. To combat this, Ford featured the car in different forms of media to attract the attention of the people (Fast and Furious 2000 maybe?).  

The Model A was the successor to the Model T. By this time, Ford had made a name for itself with the Model T, making people expect a lot from the Model A. At this time, cars had become more popular and development of roads were occurring.

This piece does have it’s limitations. The car and what people can piece together can’t tell us what it was like in the cold, or the warmth, and how effective it was in case of an accident. This car was very mainstream for the time. It started off with slower sales but quickly picked up through effective media inputs. To this day, the Model A is driven by people and modified to make Hot rods. It has been featured most recently in UK Top Gear.