1918 Fordson Tractor
Henry Ford and Son, Detroit, Michigan
Fordson was Henry Ford’s answer to help small farmers find a reliable, cheap tractor. For the entire ten-years of its production Fordson was the number one selling tractor in America. Counting production by all manufacturers in the US, 133,000 tractors were built in 1918, of those, Ford and Son Tractor Company sold 34,167 of them. By 1923 Fordson had captured 77% of the market with more than 100,000 tractors sold. During the 1920s fierce competition between Fordson and IHC continued. At times in this battle the Fordson was sold for less than the cost of production. Fordson production in the United States ended in 1928.
The design of the Fordson created a problem, fatal to some farmers. Without warning when coming out of a furrow or up a small incline the tractor could flip over on its back. Harry Ferguson’s tractor-mounted plow provided a solution. The strength of the mount kept the tractor from rearing up and had the added benefit of increasing the weight on the back wheels. Ferguson improved his design introducing his revolutionary three-point hitch system in 1939 along with Ford’s introduction of the 9-N Ford.
