I Invented the Modern Age: The Rise of Henry Ford - Hardcover

"Stylistically, Snow mimics the marvelously folksy, proteantemperament of his subject, dwelling on Ford's early mechanical inventionsrather than his latter problematic prickliness, and everywhere portraying acompelling character." * Kirkus * "Highly readable." * Publishers Weekly * "I Invented the Modern Ageis the amazing story of an amazing man, told with wit, insight, style, andzest. Richard Snow makes the invention of the automobile intelligible andfascinating even to car ignoramuses such as myself. His story of Ford theman is simply riveting. This is history as it should always be told." -- Kevin Baker * Strivers Row * "Richard Snow presents a biography of a brilliant, difficult and strange man, a technological thriller about the most important machine he made, and a social history of the country it transformed. You live in the world Henry Ford made; here is how it happened. I Invented the Modern Age is clear, amusing, stern and poignant." -- Richard Brookhiser * author of James Madison *

Every century or so, our republic has been changed by a new technology: 170 years ago it was the railroad; today it's the microprocessor. But in the early twentieth century it was the gasoline-combustion engine, built by a young, unknown, industrious man named Henry Ford. Born into a steam-powered world, the young farm boy saw the advantages of internal combustion; using his innate mechanical abilities, hard work, and imagination he transformed the US's industry and went on to become an American icon. In many ways, his story is well known; in just as many other ways, it is not. Richard Snow 'writes with verve and a keen eye' (New York Times Book Review) to weave together a fascinating narrative of Ford's rise to fame-as well as his creative personality and spirit-through his greatest invention, the Model T. The car transformed our nation in a decade, and made Ford a national hero. But then Ford soured, and the benevolent side of his character went into an ever-deepening eclipse, even as the cultural change he initiated remade America.