Henry Ford an Ignoramus?

As defined in the dictionary, an ignoramus is an ignorant person. Here's a story about Henry Ford defending in court claims that he was an ignoramus.

This excerpt was taken from "http://www.tribune.com.ng/06102007/opinion.html".

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Henry Ford, the automobile business mogul, brought suit against the Chicago Tribune, charging that newspaper with libelous publication of statements concerning him, one of which was the statement that Ford was “an ignoramus, an ignorant pacifist,” and so on. That was during World War I.

In the courtroom, the attorneys for Tribune undertook to prove that their statements were correct, that he was ignorant, and with this objective in mind, they catechized and cross-examined him on many subjects.

One question thrown at Ford was: “How many soldiers did the British send to subdue the rebellion in the colonies in 1776?” However, with a dry grin on his face, Ford nonchallantly replied: “I do not know just how many, but I have heard that it was a lot more than ever went back.”

This reply threw the courtroom into loud laughter from the jury, courtroom spectators, and even the depressed attorney who had asked the question. This line of cross-examination was prolonged for more than an hour, with Ford remaining perfectly calm. At the end, however, he was tired of it and in reply to a question which was particularly obnoxious and degrading, the business magnate straightened himself up, pointed his finger at the questioning attorney and retorted: “If I should really wish to answer the foolish question you have just asked, or any of the others you have been asking, let me remind you that I have a row of electric push buttons hanging over my desk and, by placing my finger on the right button, I could call in men who could give me the correct answers to all the questions you have asked and others that you haven’t the intelligence to ask or to answer. Now, will you kindly tell me why I should bother about filling my head with a lot of useless details in order to answer every foolish question that anyone may ask, when I have able men all around me who can supply me with all the facts I want when I call for them?”

There was graveyard silence in the courtroom. The questioning attorney’s jaw dropped and his eyes opened wide. The judge leaned forward from the bench and gazed in Mr. Ford’s direction. Many of the jury awoke and looked around as if they heard an explosion, which they actually had.

Readers, Henry Ford’s answer proved to all who had the intelligence to accept the proof that true education means mind development, not merely the gathering and classifying of knowledge. Ford could not, in all probability, have named the America’s state capitals, but he could have, and in fact had gathered the capital with which to turn many wheels within every state in the union.