Ford Motor Company. Photographic Dept.

Photographers for the Ford Motor Company Photographic Department recorded the company's evolution as an automotive manufacturer and the company's contributions to a revolutionary era of discovery and invention. They traveled throughout the country depicting branch plants and throughout the world documenting the company's expansion abroad. Photographers captured on motion picture and still film processes to acquiring raw materials as well as the air, sea, and land network of transportation that connected raw material with the manufacturing plants; all phases of production in two world wars; and company officials, employees, and visiting dignitaries. Negatives that photographers produced were arranged in a straight sequence of numbers beginning with number 1. Photographic prints were mounted on linen and albums were created that filed images into subject groupings. While no identification was recorded on the print beyond negative number, the negative log was used to record a brief description and date. Individual photographers were not listed in the log or with the image until the 1940s, but a photographer's name was often written on the envelope housing the negative.