100 pages • 3 hours read
Upton SinclairA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Chapters 1-3
Chapters 4-6
Chapters 7-9
Chapters 10-12
Chapters 13-15
Chapters 16-18
Chapters 19-21
Chapters 22-24
Chapters 25-27
Chapters 28-30
Chapters 31-33
Chapters 34-36
Chapters 37-39
Chapters 40-42
Chapters 43-45
Chapters 46-48
Chapters 49-51
Chapters 52-54
Chapters 55-57
Chapters 58-60
Chapters 61-63
Chapters 64-66
Chapters 67-69
Chapters 70-72
Chapters 73-75
Chapters 76-78
Chapters 79-81
Chapters 82-84
Chapters 85-92
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Abner, Milly, and their four children are crowded in their small apartment, and Abner’s new position has granted them a new stability. They rent a house with indoor plumbing all to themselves and stay there for several years.
Ford’s factory has grown to occupy a three-storey building “paid for entirely out of profits” (35). Both Ford and Abner are “exalted” (35) by seeing the business grow to such greatness from nothing. The new factory is a model of precision and efficiency, and Ford personally supervises the workers, periodically ordering them to work faster.
Ford attends a car race in which a French car is destroyed. He picks up a piece of the car and finds the metal, vanadium steel, far lighter and stronger than the material he uses in his cars. He hires an expert who can help him produce vanadium steel and begins to make his cars “lighter, stronger, cheaper” (36).
Abner Shutt continues to supervise the spindle-nut screwing in the factory. He no longer works with his hands except in order to demonstrate the proper technique or in case of emergency. Though he does his best in this new position, “in his secret heart he never ceased to be afraid of it” (36).
By Upton Sinclair