Ford Motor Company Consults a Poet

cstone.net

In October of 1955, Robert B. Young of Ford's Marketing Research Department contacted the American poet Marianne Moore (1887-1972) with an interesting challenge. It seems that Ford was in the process of designing an exciting new car, and they were looking for a name that would be distinctive. They would pay Ms. Moore "on a fee basis of an impeccably dignified kind."

Moore was up to the challenge. In a series of letters to Mr. Young she made interesting suggestions; here are a few:

Though Honda made a Civic and Mitsubishi produced a Diamanté, the Ford Motor Company never used Marianne Moore's suggestions. Ford's Marketing Research Manager, David Wallace, sent her a letter of apology, saying in part,

"We have chosen a name out of the more than six-thousand-odd candidates that we gathered. It has a certain ring to it. An air of gaiety and zest. At least, that's what we keep saying. Our name, dear Miss Moore, is — Edsel.

I know you will share your sympathies with us."

time.com

The Edsel was introduced in 1958. It was a spectacular failure, in part because it had been so hyped that the public was expecting a radically new kind of auto. Today, the Edsel is quite collectible — only about 10,000 exist.

Information for this posting comes from Letters of the Century, edited by Lisa Grunwald and Stephen J. Adler. It's a portrait, through fascinating letters, of the United States from 1900 to 1999. Twitter will never rival this!
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