This is a State of Michigan historic site because
it was the location of one of Henry Ford’s Nineteen Village Industries. Shortly
after World War I, when Henry Ford was building and expanding the world’s
largest manufacturing complex at River
Rouge, he also experimented with village industries. These were small
plants located in rural areas fairly close to Dearborn that would employ
modest numbers of workers to make component parts for his vehicles or for
their production. Henry Ford never wrote a long explanation for why he experimented
with village industries. Furthermore, since he made all the key decisions
for his firm, he did not have to present a management plan to a Board of
Directors or gain the approval of federal agencies. Those who have written
about the village industries speculate that Henry Ford knew that farmers’ incomes
were low and that some of them could work in a nearby plant and still maintain
their farms. This may have been his motivation. Henry Ford also had a consistent
interest in what we now call alternative sources of energy. By the end of
World War I, Ford believed that the world would someday run out of petroleum. He
used coal extensively to power his plants. Indeed, he owned coal mines
in Kentucky and purchased the Detroit Toledo and Ironton Railroad to bring
that coal to Dearborn. He knew the relatively high cost and challenges
of burning coal. Many of his village industries were former mills or on sites
of mills and used water power. Ford stated his own belief that the United
States would not become a natio
n of huge cities. He expected the growth of
many moderate-sized cities, so this view may have encouraged him to experiment
with village industries. By the time he started his village industries—about
1920—the Studebaker
plant in Detroit had been unionized. Ford consistently opposed unions
and this may have played a role in his decision to create small plants in
rural areas, but I have never seen any documentation of this.
Henry Ford established 19 village industries: the first one—in Northville—opened in 1920, while the last one—in Cherry Hill—started production in 1945. Only two of the 19 small factories closed before the end of World War II, but 16 of them were shuttered between 1947 and the late 1950s. The one in Northville remained in operation until 1989. The employment in the factories ranged from a low of just 19 workers in the Sharon Mills plant to about 1,500 in the Ypsilanti plant. Newburgh Mill was one of the smaller village industry plants with an employment of about 32. Henry Ford was known for hiring many black workers in his Detroit and Dearborn plants, but apparently no blacks were employed in any of his village industry plants until President Roosevelt Fair Employment Practices Employment went into operation in 1942. Remarkably, I believe that all of the plants used in Ford’s village industry program are still standing in 2009. Most of them are in use, but for purposes other than manufacturing.
Ford donated land to Wayne County for the Edward N. Hines Parkway under the
condition that the county dam the Middle Rouge River so that water power
could supply his Nankin Mills and Newburgh
Mill plants. A mill of sorts probably was located on this site before
Henry Ford chose this location. I believe that work began on the
building you see pictured above in about 1933, but Henry Ford visited and
found that it did not meet his standards. His expectations were very
high since he had Albert Kahn design many major buildings. He then
hired local men who constructed the small Art Deco structure you see and
were subsequently employed in it. Apparently, men in this area were
extremely grateful to Ford for his decision to rebuild the structure since
very few jobs were available during the Depression. From its opening
in 1935 until its closing in 1948, this modest plant turned out about 95
percent of the twist drills used by the Ford Motor Company. This
is known as the Newburgh Mill since it was located near the village of
Newburgh that is now included with Livonia. Nearby on Ann Arbor Trail,
you will find Newburg Cemetery and Newburgh
United Methodist Church.
Some years after Ford closed this operation, the building was taken over by the Sheriff’s Department and/or the Parks Department of Wayne County. A large barn building next door was converted into stables for the Wayne County Sheriff’s horses. It is still used for that purpose and the Newburgh Mill itself appears to be an office building linked to the horse unit.
Architect: Unknown to me
Architectural Style: Art Deco
Date of Construction: 1934
State of Michigan Registry of Historic Sites: P25,331 Listed September
7, 1989
State of Michigan Historic Marker: None put in place
National Register of Historic Places: Not listed
Use in 2009: This building is used by the Office of the Sheriff of Wayne
County and the Wayne County Parks Department. A nearby building is a
barn that houses the horses used by Wayne County Sheriff deputies.
Book describing Henry Ford’s Village Industries: Howard P. Segal, Recasting
the Machine Age: Henry Ford’s Village Industries (Boston: University
of Massachusetts Press, 2005)
Photograph: Ren Farley, March 27, 2009
Description Prepared: March 29, 2009
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