Page:Henry Ford's Own Story.djvu/152

 his net earnings increasing faster than he could possibly put them back into the business.

At the end of that year he and Couzens sat in their offices going over the balance sheets of the company. The size of the bank balance was most satisfactory. The factory was running to the limit of its capacity, orders were waiting. Prospects were bright for the following season. Ford leaned back in his chair.

"Well, I guess we're out of the woods, all right," he said. He put his hands in his pockets and looked thoughtfully at the ceiling. "Remember that time in the Mack avenue place," he began, "when that Chicago check didn't come in, and we couldn't pay the men ?"

"I should say I do! And the day we got the first order from Cleveland. Remember how you worked in the shop yourself to get it out?"

"And you hustled out and got material on sixty days time? And the boys worked all night, and we had to wait till the money came from Cleveland before we could give them their overtime? That was a great bunch of men we had then."

They began to talk them over. Most of them were managers of departments now; one was handling the sales force, another had developed into a driver and won many trophies and broken many records with the Ford car; Wills was superintendent of the factory.

"I tell you, Couzens, you and I have been at the head of the concern, and we've done some big