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
Ford has also been sued by the Dodge brothers, who had made 650 engines for use in the first Ford cars in exchange for Ford stock but have never received any dividends.
Ford does not believe in “paying rent for the use of money [or] letting people get money which they hadn’t earned by useful labour” (94), so he uses the Ford Company’s profits to invest in capital. The Dodge brothers win their suit and Ford is ordered to pay dividends to his stockholders.
In response, Ford spreads a rumor that he intends to start a new company with his son to make cars that will retail for $250. The minority stockholders are alarmed and sell their stock for “a small part of the market value”; still, they make “a thousand times what they had invested in the business” (95).
Abner and his father calculate how much money their family had had in savings back when Ford was inventing his first car, and how much they would have today if they had invested the money in the Ford Company. Everyone else who had known Ford in the early days makes the same calculation, and “the fact that such prizes were being drawn lent a thrill to being alive” (96).
By Upton Sinclair