The rocky road to mass production: change and continuity in the US foundry industry, 1890-1940

Harris, HJ

Abstract

This article is a pioneering exploration of technological change in the U.S. foundry industry from the period of its most dramatic growth through its interwar stagnation and decline. Not only does it describe key changes in the mechanization and reorganization of manufacturing processes that helped transform parts of the industry into sites of classic 'Fordist' mass production, but it also explains why the impact of these changes was so slow and limited. Through analysis that divides the 'foundry industry' into its constituent parts (defined in terms of the forms of business organization and the types of product market that characterized them), the article locates change and continuity within different sectors of an 'industry' that was in fact plural rather than singular.

Citation

Harris, H. (2000). The rocky road to mass production: change and continuity in the US foundry industry, 1890-1940. Enterprise & Society: The International Journal of Business History, 1(2), 391-437. https://doi.org/10.1093/es/1.2.391

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Jun 1, 2000
• Deposit Date: Jan 5, 2011
• Journal: Enterprise and Society: The International Journal of Business History
• Print ISSN: 1467-2227
• Electronic ISSN: 1467-2235
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 1
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 391-437
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/es/1.2.391
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1602051