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Reviews
| The Dodge Brothers: The Men, the Motor Cars, and the Legacy. By Charles K. Hyde. Detroit: Wayne State Univ. Press, 2005. xvi+261 pp., illus., notes, index. $34.95 hb (ISBN 0-8143-3246-3).
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The Dodge Brothers: The Men, the Motor Cars, and the Legacy by Charles K. Hyde is a well-written and comprehensive examination of the careers of John and Horace Dodge, brothers who had a significant influence on the development of the American automobile industry. Hyde's book is organized around five salient and well-documented themes. The Dodge brothers formed a complementary partnership with shared responsibility for all automotive creations. Their careers were prime examples of the historical process by which Detroit became the motorcar capital of the United States. Their complex, long-term business relationship as vendors to Ford Motor Company gave them the experience and financial means to begin the production of a robust, mid-priced automobile. The Dodge brothers were true technical innovators, particularly pioneering the employment of the all-steel car body. Unlike the better-known carmakers such as Henry Ford, William C. Durant, and Walter Chrysler, the Dodge brothers created their industrial empire solely from their own resources, without the contributions of stockholders, bankers, or outside investors.
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Like many other pioneers of the American automotive industry, the Dodge brothers began their careers as machinists and, in particular, gained vital experience by manufacturing bicycles. Their nine years with bicycle companies provided them with their earliest opportunities to become mechanical innovators. A series of bicycle business mergers later provided John and Horace Dodge with a substantial amount of capital. These funds allowed them to establish their own machine shop in Detroit.
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The particular closeness of the Dodge brothers' business partnership was a major factor in their early success as independent manufacturers. The brothers' individual talents and personalities meshed extremely well.
John and Horace Dodge's success as engineers, designers and manufacturers, largely resulted from their complementary talents and their ability to work together. Throughout their careers as independent businessmen, they made all of the important decisions together. They did have a basic division of labor in their work. John Dodge negotiated contracts with suppliers; managed the firm's finances; directed sales, advertising, and public relations; and served as general administrator for the company. Horace Dodge was a mechanical genius who designed the products Dodge Brothers manufactured and many machines used in their operations. He organized and managed production. The shop floor was Horace's domain (pp. 104–105).
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The Dodge Brothers machine shop was developed at a time when almost all automobile manufacturers were primarily assemblers of components purchased from outside suppliers. It was within this context that Ransom E. Olds greatly transformed the fortunes of the Dodge brothers' enterprise. Olds was the founder of the Detroit region's motorcar industry and the most important early automotive pioneer in the United States. His large order for transmissions needed for the curved dash Oldsmobile, the first car to be manufactured in large numbers in the United States, convinced the Dodge brothers to focus their attentions almost exclusively on providing parts for this new industry. Their success in filling the Olds contract led them to enter into what Hyde has called "a business partnership unlike any other in the American Automobile industry." Henry Ford, who had recently established an automotive manufacturing concern, asked the Dodges to become his major parts supplier. This relationship was beneficial to both parties. By 1910 the profits from the Ford contract had made the brothers wealthy men and enabled them to greatly expand their manufacturing operations. They constructed a huge new plant in Hamtramck.
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The campaign by Ford Motors to manufacture an ever increasing percentage of its own parts led the Dodge brothers to take the momentous step of embarking on the design and production of their own automobile line. On 31 July 1913, the Dodge brothers notified Henry Ford that they would cease producing parts for him within a year. Since they remained large stockholders in Ford's company, Ford found himself in the position of, in effect, subsidizing the creation of a potential competitor. Ford thus attempted to curtail the distribution of the excess profits of the Ford Motor Company, prompting a lawsuit from John and Horace Dodge. The affair was brought to an end in 1919 when Henry Ford purchased their shares in his company for $25,000,000.00.
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Beginning in 1913, John and Horace converted their company from the largest American supplier of auto parts into a massive and profitable producer of a popular mid-priced car of their own design. Their new car had an extremely innovative design. It was not a price competitor of Ford's Model T, but it was superior to the more famous "Tin-Lizzie" in many ways, the most significant of which was the use of all-steel bodies.
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The all-steel car body was the creation of Edward Budd, who established a company to manufacture this product in Philadelphia. The Dodge automobile was the first mass-produced car to make use of this innovation. Its success set a new standard for the American automotive industry, which had traditionally used a composite body with an inner wooden frame supporting an outer metal shell. Budd's welded, stamped-steel bodies made the Dodge cars both stronger and lighter than rivals' cars. Within a decade, all-metal bodies would become the industry standard.
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According to Hyde, the most amazing achievement of the Dodge brothers was their ability to finance the creation of a large automobile company solely through their own financial resources.
Placing the lives and careers of The Dodge Brothers in perspective can be accomplished by comparing them with contemporary auto industry pioneers and leaders ... Their management style reflected their equal partnership in the venture and the relatively simple nature of their enterprise. Unlike Ford, Durant and Sloan; the Dodges enjoyed full ownership of Dodge Brothers from the beginning. They never borrowed from banks, never had to consider stockholders or a Board of Directors in making business decisions (p. 205).
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The primary focus of The Dodge Brothers is the careers of John and Horace Dodge as auto manufacturers, but Hyde also interprets their personalities and the working-class milieu that shaped their characters. He does not gloss over the fact that the Dodge brothers had nasty tempers, were prone to physical altercations, and were heavy drinkers. However, Hyde also notes that working conditions in the Hamtramck Plant were more humane than working conditions at Ford's Highland Park Plant. The brothers also pioneered in the employment of African Americans in the automobile industry. Finally, John and Horace Dodge generously supported many local charities.
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| While the achievements of the Dodge brothers were substantial, they are little remembered in Detroit. Their true legacy, the Dodge car, however, remains in production, and it is a vital part of the modern Daimler Chrysler Corporation. Hyde's The Dodge Brothers: The Men, the Motor Cars, and the Legacy provides further evidence of the "Brothers" manifold achievements as well as insights into the business operations of Detroit's early automobile industry. |
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