:Y^idg ÒgZY dkZg hidgn VWdji Henry Ford’s antisemitism

THE MAYOR of a Michigan city caused an outcry in the US after firing the editor of a city-funded magazine that ran an article about the antisemitic nature of the city’s most famous inhabitant.

Dearborn’s mayor John B. O’Reilly fired Bill McGraw, editor of the Dearborn Historian, and ordered the recall of all copies of the latest issue of the periodical after it ran a cover story on the virulent antisemitism of Henry Ford.

In a statement, the Dearborn mayor said: “It was thought that by presenting information from 100 years ago that included hateful messages — without a compelling reason directly linked to events in Dearborn today — this edition of the Historian could become a distraction from our continuing messages of inclusion and respect.”

The full article was subsequently published by the Deadline Detroit website.

Ford, one of the most famous businessmen of the early 20th century, founded the Ford Motor Company. His assembly line techniques helped him build an automobile empire.

But as an avowed antisemite, he also used a newspaper he purchased in 1919, the Dearborn Independent, to spread antisemitic articles to hundreds of thousands of readers.

Mr Ford also paid for half a million copies of the translation of a notorious antisemitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Henry Ford