I’ve often posted photos of ROROs and PCTCs, but here’s the old school. Here’s a Ford ship loading Ford cars from the Chester PA plant. MV Lake Benbow was one of the first six Ford-owned vessels transporting Ford products around the world. Click here for her interesting history: built 1918 for the US Naval Overseas Transport Service (NOTS), purchased by Ford in 1925, which operated it until 1937. Given the automobiles awaiting loading, maybe 1935 Fords, this photo appears to have been taken near the end of its time as a Ford vessel.
The Chester plant made Fords from 1927 until 1958. Click here for more photos and info on the Chester plant. When that plant closed, operations moved to Mahwah NJ, where after some years, the same script was followed.
Click here for Ford production location photos both vintage and abroad.
Ford was know to have tried to own all aspects of their operation, from the Fordlandia gambit to northern forests and mines, but other companies like US Steel, Bethlehem, fruit companies and petroleum companies did the same. By the way, now that it’s summer BBQ season, do you know the connection between Ford and Kingsford charcoal?
Again, thanks to barrel for these photos.
tugster: a waterblog 
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June 9, 2016 at 11:24 am
bowsprite
drooooool! how beautiful!
Thinking of Ford Pinto’s, I found this: http://www.cheatsheet.com/automobiles/10-of-historys-most-infamous-automotive-scandals.html/?a=viewall
–minus mention of VW.
June 9, 2016 at 11:26 am
bowsprite
Barrel has absolutely the most beautiful photographs. Thank you. I love seeing them. Just scrolled through the collection. A book on the horizon, I hope–I put my pre-order in.
June 9, 2016 at 11:44 am
eastriver
Thanks, Will and Barrel! Good odd one.
June 9, 2016 at 2:57 pm
sfdi1947
Ford was the 1st true, amoral multinational, actively doing business with and providing both services and materials to the Germans, Italians, and Japanese during WW II using both Argentina, Uruguay, and Iran as proxies to sell and deliver goods.
Both the Roosevelt and Truman Administration knew this and received large and significant favors for looking the other way.
GM also supplied Railroad (EMD) products to Germany that were likely coopted into submarine production.
This is one of the faults of capitalism, but one would think that a corporation should have some loyalty during a conflict.
June 9, 2016 at 3:24 pm
tugster
It’s a fact that the Luftwaffe could not have flown without a fuel component sold only by Standard Oil: http://www.mit.edu/~thistle/v13/3/oil.html
June 9, 2016 at 3:38 pm
sfdi1947
Yup! Kinda makes me wonder why the war wasn’t settled in the twenties when the European Capital/Inflation crisis that started the Great Depression.