1001 People Who Made America - Alan Axelrod [42]
Ford, Henry (1863–1947) Raised on a Michigan farm, Ford grew up more interested in machines than crops and livestock. He began working as a machinist and was drawn to the newly developed internal combustion engine. This led to his tinkering together his first automobile, which, in 1899 spawned the Detroit Automobile Company (later the Henry Ford Company). But it was in 1908, with the introduction of the Model T, that Ford began the simultaneous transformation of industrial production—indeed, the very nature of work—with the modern assembly line and the transformation of America: its habits of consumption, its manner of living, its culture, and its landscape. The widespread availability of private transportation in the form of affordable automobiles remade America from a collection of cities, isolated villages, and farms, into a new form of civilization networked by roads and driven by a new ethic of personal freedom.
Ford, John (1895–1973) Born Sean Aloysius O’Feeney in Maine, Ford moved to Hollywood in 1914, became a prop man for a film studio, changed his name, and directed his first movies in the 1920s. As a director, he was noted for brilliant cutting, which put the emphasis on action without ever compromising sharp and colorful characterization. Some of his most notable films—The Grapes of Wrath (1940), How Green Was My Valley (1941), and The Quiet Man (1952)—won Academy Awards for direction and emphasized social themes, but he is even better remembered as a master of the western genre, with such classics as Stagecoach (1939), My Darling Clementine (1946), The Searchers (1956), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), How the West Was Won (1962), and Cheyenne Autumn (1964).
Forrest, Edwin (1806–1872) One the great tragedians of the 19th-century American stage, Forrest started a feud with the English actor William Macready, which triggered in May 1849 the Astor Place riot in New York City as a mob of Forrest partisans stormed the Astor Place Opera House, where Macready was appearing. Twenty-two persons were killed and 36 wounded. Forrest’s reputation was another casualty of the riot. Two years later, he stirred a fresh scandal when he sued his actress wife for divorce on grounds of adultery. He lost, but obsessively appealed for 18 years, during which time he became a recluse. Forrest’s experience is an early example of the nation’s limitless appetite for scandal.
Forrest, Nathan Bedford (1821–1877) Self-taught in everything, including the military art, Forrest was commander of great skill and daring, considered by William T. Sherman the most dangerous man in the Confederacy. His philosophy of combat was simple: “Get there first with the most men” (often misquoted as “Get there firstest with the mostest”). His reputation for ruthlessness was certified by his role in the Ft. Pillow Massacre (April 12, 1864), in which more than 300 African-American troops were slaughtered after they surrendered. Following the war, Forrest organized the original Ku Klux Klan, serving for a time as its Grand Wizard.
Frankenthaler, Helen (1928– ) Strongly influenced by the work of Arshile Gorky and Jackson Pollock, Frankenthaler developed her own style of abstract expressionism, creating ethereal works by applying thinned oil paints onto unprimed canvas in a stain technique that broke with the heavy application of paint (impasto) in vogue among other abstract expressionists. Frankenthaler’s lyrical works inspired the next generation of painters, the so-called color-field painters, including Morris Louis.
Frankfurter, Felix (1882–1965) Born in Vienna, Austria, Frankfurter immigrated to the United States with his family in 1893. Earning his law degree from Harvard, he was a brilliant scholar and adviser to presidents, beginning with Woodrow Wilson during the negotiation