#119 The Dodge Brothers

**David Senra** (0:00)
I want to tell you about a one time only limited event that I don't think you're going to want to miss. I am doing a live show with Patrick O'Shaughnessy from the Invest Like the Best podcast in New York City on October 19th. Patrick has interviewed over 300 of the world's best investors and founders for his podcast. I've read over 300 biographies of history's greatest entrepreneurs for my podcast. We'll be talking about what we learned from seven years of podcasting, sharing our favorite ideas and stories, and doing a live Q&A. There will also be special event-only swag. If you live in New York City, I think it's a no-brainer. But if not, I think it's a great excuse to fly in. I've already heard from a bunch of people that bought tickets, they're flying in from other cities. Some people are flying in from other countries. That's setting the bar really high, so I will have at least four shots of espresso, or four energy drinks before or during the show, so we can make it a night that you'll never forget. If you're interested in attending this unique live event, I will leave a link down below. I highly recommend you get your tickets today, and I hope I get to see you in New York on October 19th. This is the story of two small town machinists who became enormously successful automobile manufacturers in the early years of the auto industry.
At the start of the Ford Motor Company in 1903, the Dodge Brothers supplied nearly every car part needed by the up and coming auto giant. After 15 years of operating a successful automotive supplier company, much to Ford's advantage, John and Horace Dodge again changed the face of the automotive market in 1914 by introducing their own car. The Dodge Brothers automobile carried on their names even after their untimely deaths in 1920, with the company remaining in the hands of their widows until its sale in 1925 to New York bankers and then the subsequent purchase in 1928 by Walter Chrysler. The Dodge nameplate has endured, but despite their achievements and their critical role in the early success of Henry Ford, John and Horace Dodge are usually overlooked in histories of the early automotive industry.
Some historians continue to understate the importance of John and Horace Dodge to the automobile industry. This book is the first scholarly study of the Dodge Brothers and their company, chronicling their lives from their childhood in Michigan to their long years of learning the machinist trade and then examining their influence on automotive manufacturing and marketing trends in the early part of the 20th century.
Hyde, that's the author's name, details the Brothers' civic contributions to Detroit, their hiring of minorities and women, and their often anonymous charitable contributions to local organizations. Hyde puts the Dodge Brothers' lives and accomplishments in perspective by indicating their long-term influence, which has continued long after their deaths.
The most complete and accurate resource on John and Horace Dodge available, the Dodge Brothers uses sources that have never before been examined. Its scholarly approach and personal tone make this book appealing for automotive historians as well as car enthusiasts and those interested in Detroit's early development.
Okay, so that was an excerpt from the book that I'm going to talk to you about today, and I think also describes exactly why we should spend it, spend time studying it, and that book is called The Dodge Brothers, The Men, the Motor Cars, and the Legacy by Charlie Hyde. Okay, so I talked about this last week, and over the next few weeks, I'm going to do a multi-part series. So last week, we started with my 40 years with Ford, and I want to focus on all the pioneers of the automobile industry that birthed out of the state of Michigan in the early 1900s. So today, we're going to talk about the Dodge Brothers moving forward. We're going to cover people like the founders of GM, Cadillac, and Chrysler, and any others I discover along the way. So for today, I'm going to start, let's start right with their early life, and tell you a little bit about that. And I'm going to focus mostly on their career, because this is a biography of the Dodge Brothers, but I would say the majority of the book is actually a biography of the Dodge Company. And there's just a lot of detail in here I think that we're going to find interesting. All right, so let's go to the book. Early on, he says, the brothers grew up in a family that included a father and two uncles who were machinists by trade. They were two fiercely independent, but inseparable, redheaded brothers.