Talk:Ford Pilot

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[edit] Tidy-up and querying spelling

I have just come across this article. This is a British car, so the least I can do is ensure that the article is spelt correctly and all questionable references backed-up by facts.

Facts, facts, facts. Let's get our facts right, people! One only need view the Ford Zephyr entry to see that these vehicles were not released to a (car-hungry) public until 1951, not 1950 (the year in which they debuted at Earl's Court).

I know the Pilot was actually sold in New Zealand until 1954, but as I have no book to quote I am loathe to include this information.

What is this rubbish about Henry Ford not allowing the Ford badge on the Pilot? Do you know where he was in August 1947 - dead, that's where! (after having suffered several strokes).

For some time until September 1945, the day-to-day running of the Ford Motor Company US was handled by his somewhat violent right-hand man, Harry Bennett. Ford's grandson, Henry Ford II, wrested company presidency in September 1945 after his grandmother Clara threatened Henry Ford I that she would sell her stock in the company if he did not step down. So if anyone had a say in Ford badges, it would be Henry II, but this still needs a citation, please!

One more (constructive) gripe, Wikipedia administrators. American web pages about American topics have American spelling, and no-one questions this. Why does a page about a British topic have "Kerb weight" spelt as "Curb weight". Can this be changed, please! Johnr_roberts 21:46, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

If you look at the history of the article, you'll see that someone entered II (as in Roman 2) after Henry Ford's name and someone else removed it. That's the price you pay for having an entry contributed by a self selecting committee. There are good things about the wiki way and there are others.

The good news is that if you think it sufficiently important, you can correct errors where you spot them. If you did, thank you in the name of truth (and in the name of me).

People get very agitated about whether an entry should be written in English or in American. I can't quote what the policy is at the moment, because I think it changes sometimes. I think the languages are sufficiently close for us to tolerate the differences without undue impact on the blood pressure. Why should we wish to? Because together we learn more from each other than we would learn if we separated UK wiki from US wiki. But I am sorry if you have a contrary view.

There is a lot of 'careless' chronology as people confuse the date when a car first rolled off the production line, the date when it was first advertised in a Wellington (NZ) newspaper, and the date when you could actually buy the things in England (GB). Back in the late 1940s UK manufacturers' were having their arms officially twisted to get them to "export or die", so you often get British (allegedly) new models sold outside of Britain long before the hapless Brits had a hope in Havant of getting hold of one. There was a long wiki-discussion involving our transatlantic cousins about whether years used in car articles should be model years (running, I think, from more or less October) or not (running, I think, from more or less January). And before you get all superior and British about it (assuming you think yourself a Brit) remember that your local tax gatherers still follow a calendar which most of us - even in protestant England - gave up on back in 1750something. I think the answer for wiki articles is to spell out what you mean. "First presented to the public in a series of press leaks in December 1967". Or "first rolled off the production line when the Halewood plant reopened after the summer break in 1967". Or "announced Jan 1969" (if it was). Those dates are from memory so probably wrong, by the way. If you want to go through the wiki car articles and pin down some of those details as to launch date - and what it meant in each case, you'd be doing a service to us all. And to truth. If you just want to slag off a mixed bag of (mainly well intentioned) bozoes you never met .... well, I guess that looks like fun, too.

Sometimes, of course, the problem is not the difference between Brit speak and Oz speak and whatever it is they use in Chicago: it's that folks can't spell. That seems to be more of a problem now that we are encouraged to trust Bill Gates on spelling. Well, I don't. But I still don't spell too well, and am always happy to see wiki-spelling errors (mine or anyone else's) corrected (by you or anyone else). Mit Dank im Voraus. Regards Charles01 (talk) 12:21, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

PS Thanks for the insights into Ford family politics in the 1940s. Harry Bennett sounds like a man who deserves a wiki entry of his own. Happily, I see someone already started it.