Edison As I Know Him.

FORD, Henry. In Collaboration with Samuel Crowther [Thomas A. Edison].

Item Number: 111080

New York: Cosmopolitan Book Company, 1930.

First edition of Henry Ford’s intimate biography of his mentor and friend, Thomas Edison, whom he credited with assisting in the realization of the modern automobile. Octavo, original half cloth, illustrated with photographs including frontispiece of Edison in his laboratory. Signed by Henry Ford and Thomas Edison on the front free endpaper. In very good condition, most rare and desirable signed by both Ford and Edison.

Henry Ford first met Thomas Edison in 1896, shortly after the completion of his first self-propelled vehicle, the Ford Quadricycle. Edison approved of Ford's plans to improve the vehicle, and with Edison's encouragement, developed several models which would evolve into the modern automobile. In the present volume, Ford states, "To Edison must be given some of the credit for hastening the realization of the automobile as we know it today - with an internal-combustion engine... The man stands as a demonstration of what concentration and intelligence can accomplish... I have never known anyone who could match him in a single one of his outstanding qualities - in his imagination, his reasoning, his memory, his patience or his capacity for hard work and hard thought... The American spirit of endeavor as represented in its fullness by Thomas Alva Edison is the real wealth of the nation."