Willow Run

Warren

INTRODUCTION

I have been a member of the Yankee Air Museum located at Willow Run since 1985. This book is a snapshot of the story that the Yankee Air Museum will tell when it moves into the former Willow Run Bomber Plant.

My earliest memories of Willow Run go back to 1947 when I was four years old. My parents and I were driving out to Willow Run Airport for some reason, and my father pointed to this giant building that seemed to run the length of Ecorse Road. He said, That is where I worked during the war. I built B-24 Bombers. Every time the family would drive by Willow Run, he would repeat this story. When veteran Ford Motor Company manufacturing expert Mead Bricker took over the Willow Run factory and instituted his 505 program, the outsourcing of small parts production became an improved mode of operation at Willow Run. In the 1930s, all Ford dealers had machine shops. These dealership machine shops became largely idle due to World War II wartime rationing of cars, gas, and tires. To utilize this untapped production potential, jobs were assigned to these dealerships, and my dad would set up and manage these projects.

Accounts of World War II are centered around the attack on Pearl Harbor, the great battles at Midway, the landings at Normandy, and the Battle of Bulge. There is no doubt that the heroics and dedication of our military men made these victories possible. But World War II was a war of machines. Those machines would come from American industry that was centered in Detroit. The manufacturing mastery developed in Detroit would save the world from Axis domination.

The United States committed to fight World War II with machines, and the machine that defined America’s war effort was the four-engine bomber. In September 1940, the Battle of Britain had been won; the fighters flown by the RAF Few had defended England, but the four-engine bomber was already identified as the offensive weapon to carry the war to Germany. The auto industry would be become the backbone of four-engine bomber production. The airplanes would have names on them like Consolidated and Boeing. However, inside those bombers you would find parts with names on them like Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Briggs, Nash, Hudson, Budd, Studebaker, Buick, and Delco-Remy. Ford Motor Company would build a factory to mass-produce four-engine bombers like cars. It would be built beside a sleepy little creek near Ypsilanti, Michigan, named Willow Run, and it would be the largest factory ever built up to that time. The bomber factory would later be called the Willow Run Bomber Plant and would become the manifestation of America’s ability to outproduce anyone in the world.

As the European nations prepared for war, the United States elected to withdraw from world affairs. With the Depression in full swing, the Army Air Corps was a hollow force. The aircraft industry that supported the Army Air Corps was barely surviving on a thin dribble of orders. Soon, though, the White House would want airplanes by the 10,000s. In May 1940, President Roosevelt called for 50,000 military airplanes a year. He then drafted the president of General Motors, William Knudsen, to spearhead this production goal. Knudsen was appointed as the production expert on the National Defense Advisory Commission. He knew this lofty goal of 50,000 airplanes would not be reached without tapping the manufacturing mastery of Detroit’s auto companies to produce aircraft parts.

But before that could happen, Knudsen knew he had to remove the obstacles to manufacturing that were centered in the entrenched bureaucratic policies found in Washington, DC. There was no time for the old contract processes; tax laws would need to be changed, and incentives given to make it attractive for companies to do business with the government. With removal of these obstacles, four-engine bomber production levels would grow over twentyfold in the next 18 months under Knudsen’s leadership.

On September 9, 1940, the first US War Department aircraft production Schedule 8-A was published, under the guise of Defense work. Under this schedule, there would be 1,047 four-engine bombers built in the next 28 months, before the end the 1942, at a rate of about 47 per month. That September, Knudsen visited existing airplane plants, largely on the West Coast, finding US bomber production capability inadequate. He proposed to President Roosevelt that two government-owned factories be built to produce bombers. Congress then approved funds for the government aircraft factories. Gen. Henry H. Hap Arnold, chief of staff of the Army Air Corps, notified Knudsen that these plants should be built to produce four-engine bombers.

On October 4, 1940, Robert Patterson, assistant secretary of war, expressed concern about where the parts would come from to build airplanes. Knudsen took the lead and broke the stalemate; no one knew the productive potential of Detroit better than he did. And it was Knudsen rather than other auto executives or Army Air Corps officers who took the initiative of calling in America’s automobile manufacturers. He addressed a meeting of automakers on October 15, 1940, at the New York Auto Show held at Madison Square Garden. There, he asked for their help in building the bombers. Patterson stated on October 18 that the four-engine bomber had to be the production focus, for only that bomber could exert power in the Far East because of the great distances it could go. Schedule 8-A was superseded on October 23, replaced by Schedule 8-B; this changed aircraft production goals with a shift to four-engine bombers. Patterson and Hap Arnold told Knudsen that the four-engine B-24 and twin-engine B-26 should be built at the two new factories recently approved by Congress. At that time, George Mead, head of the Aeronautical Section of the National Defense Advisory Commission, requested costs to build 100 Consolidated B-24 heavy bombers and 200 Martin B-26 medium bombers a month at the two new government factories. On October 25, Knudsen brought the powerful Automobile Manufacturers Association (AMA), aircraft manufacturers, and the Army Air Corps together at the New Center Building in Detroit. There, he laid the groundwork for building 12,000 additional bombers over the then current bomber production plan.

But in early November, it was determined that the two new factories approved in September would not to be able to build an additional 12,000 bombers by 1942. Mead told Knudsen on November 15, 1940, that Consolidated Aircraft and Martin Aircraft companies had agreed to sell the right to build airplanes to the auto companies. The auto companies would use their managerial and design talent to build subassemblies for the new bomber plants. President Roosevelt fully supported this program and approved the $1 billion project to build the bomber plants at Kansas City, Missouri, and Omaha, Nebraska. In a November 18 memo to Knudsen, more than a year before Pearl Harbor, Mead stated if further expansion was needed, the larger auto companies would have to be licensed to build complete airplanes. This laid the groundwork for building Willow Run and suggested all expansion in bomber production now would come from the auto companies. This included filling a tremendous need for aircraft engines. At this time, Hap Arnold issued a directive that all bomber factories should be designed big enough to build the larger B-29 or B-32 bombers still years away. This is why Willow Run has delivery doors that are 144 feet wide when the B-24 only had a 110-foot wingspan.

In December, Patterson stated there was too much work being scheduled at the two new factories and the shortage of workers would hinder production. He requested that the government construct two more bomber factories in order to build