When Ed and I visited Lynn a few weeks ago in Florida, we went to Edison and Ford's summer estate and labs. The lab was focussed, in the period show, on creating a replacement for rubber. Ford and Firestone (the tire guy) both wanted some replacement for natural rubber then used in tires.
The only source was the rubber tree, and those grew in the Amazon and southeast Asia. Henry Ford even created a city in the Amazon basin to harvest rubber.
Ford and the government were worried that our supply of rubber might be cut off in wartime, so Edison was chartered to find a source that could be grown int he USA. Ultimately they cross bred a massive and quick growing version of goldenrod (imaging the impact on my allergies is frightening) - nearly 12 feet high.
Ultimately they did not use the goldenrod, since it was more expensive and harder to grown than natural rubber. And synthetic rubber quickly gained ground after it was discovered as a petrochemical product.
There was also two models of Fords I had to take a picture of (there were more, but these two I loved). The first is a Model T that Ford gave to Edison early in their friendship in 1916. It looks impressive for being the first assembly-built car.
The second is the 1937 Ford Five Window Coupe. I suppose when it was built the definition of "coupe" did not require the absence of window pillers.
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