Page:Henry Ford's Own Story.djvu/88

 EIGHT HOURS, BUT NOT FOR HIMSELF

Henry Ford became manager of the mechanical department the workmen in the Edison plants were working twelve-hour shifts as a matter of course. In those days the theory of practically all employers was that men, like the rest of their equipment, should be worked to the limit of their strength.

"We had about forty men on the regular list and four or five substitutes who were kept busy filling in for the regular men who were sick or tired out," he said. "I hadn't been in charge long before it struck me there was something wrong. If our machines had broken down as often as our men did anybody would have known we weren't handling them right.

"No good engineer will run a machine at the limit of its power and speed for very long. It hurts the machine. It isn't sentimentalism to take care of the machine; it's plain common sense and efficiency. It isn't sentimentalism to look out for the interests of the men.

"The sooner people get over the idea that there's a difference between ideals of brotherhood and practical common sense the sooner we'll do