That Mr Henry Ford is a resourceful man, I knew, but his latest brain-wave seems to me to out-do all his previous operations. He has acquired a large melon farm, whose products he intends to use for commercial purposes. From the melons he proposes to extract alcohol for paint, and with the residues to make a substance serviceable as wood. The idea is a good one, and, if the wood is produced on the same scale as the cars, the dumping of Russian timber need be feared no longer.
Mr Ford is a great believer in the adage, "Waste not, want not," and the principle of that proverb is carried out in all his factories. Everything in the Ford works that can be utilised is salvaged, and the Ford Company estimate that through their salvage system they make a net profit of between four and five million dollars a year. In the large Ford plant at Dearborn, Michigan, some 800 men are employed in salvaging operations. They reclaim everything from tin tacks to derelict barges. As many as 600 old cars a day are stripped and melted for use in making steel. Up to the present, I am told, more than 55,000 old cars have been bought for this purpose. Few people would think of saving small boards with nails in them, but in Ford's no board as big as 3 inches long and 1-1/2 inches wide is thrown away, and all nails are salvaged. The nails are sent to the foundry at the rate of 75 kegs a day, and 9,000 boxes are made every day from the saved wood. It is little wonder that Ford cars can be turned out cheaply.
The Irish Times, June 27th, 1931.