Fordlândia

Fordlândia (Portuguese pronunciation: [fɔʁdʒiˈlɐ̃dʒjɐ], Ford-land) is a district and adjacent area of 14,268 square kilometres (5,509 sq mi) in the city of Aveiro, in the Brazilian state of Pará. It is located on the east banks of the Tapajós river roughly 300 kilometres (190 mi) south of the city of Santarém.
It was established by American industrialist Henry Ford in the Amazon Rainforest in 1928 as a prefabricated industrial town intended to be inhabited by 10,000 people to secure a source of cultivated rubber for the automobile manufacturing operations of the Ford Motor Company in the United States. Ford had negotiated a deal with the Brazilian government granting him a concession of 10,000 km (3,900 sq mi) of land on the banks of the Rio Tapajós near the city of Santarém, Brazil, in exchange for a 9% share in the profits generated. Ford's project failed, and the city was abandoned in 1934.
The town was mostly deserted, with only 90 residents still living in the city until the early 2000s when it saw an increase of population, being home to around 3,000 people as of 2017.
In the 1920s, the Ford Motor Company sought to elude the British monopoly over the supply of rubber, mainly used for producing tires and other car parts. Henry Ford looked for alternatives and a permanent place to establish a colony to produce rubber. Central America was considered; however, information about the rubber trees in the Amazon was uncovered and this, along with other factors, caused a change of plans.
Negotiations with the Brazilian government started during the visit by then-governor of the State of Pará, Dionísio Bentes [pt], to the United States to meet Ford. An agreement was signed and the American industrialist received an area of about 2.5 million acres (10,100 km) called "Boa Vista". The agreement exempted Ford from taxes on the exportation of goods produced in Brazil in exchange for 9% of the profits, 7% going to the Brazilian government and 2% of profits to local municipalities.
Work on the area began in 1926 by the Companhia Ford Industrial do Brasil. It was immediately hindered by poor logistics and diseases that affected the workers who succumbed to yellow fever and malaria. No roads were available in the area thus the area was only accessible by the Tapajós River. The site was developed as a planned community with different areas of the city being designated for the Brazilian workers and the American managers, who lived in the so-called American Village. Typical American houses were built, as were a hospital, school, library, and hotel. The town also had a swimming pool, a playground, and a golf course.
In 1928, the Ford Motor Company sent two merchant ships – Lake Ormoc and Lake Farge – loaded with equipment and furnishings ranging from doorknobs to the town's water tower. The town was then founded under the name Fordlândia.
Seeking workers, several offices were opened in the cities of Belém and Manaus, and, with the promise of good wages, people of the nearby states answered.
In lower temperatures, the latex is concentrated in the lower areas of the tree, as the temperature rises during the day the latex spreads throughout the tree, making the tapping less effective. Due to this, the typical journey of a rubber tapper began early in the morning, at around 5 am, ending at noon. The plantation was divided into areas and each worker was assigned to a different area to prevent workers from tapping the same trees successively.
The town had a strict set of rules imposed by the managers. Alcohol, tobacco and prostitution were forbidden within the town, including inside the workers' own homes. Inspectors (American managers) would go from house to house to check how organized the houses were and to enforce these rules. The inhabitants circumvented these prohibitions by paddling out to merchant riverboats moored beyond the town jurisdiction, often hiding contraband goods inside fruits like watermelons. A small settlement was established 8 kilometres (5 mi) upstream on the "Island of Innocence" with bars, nightclubs and brothels.
The land was hilly, rocky and infertile. None of Ford's managers had the requisite knowledge of tropical agriculture. In the wild, the rubber trees grow apart from each other as a protection mechanism against plagues and diseases, often growing close to bigger trees of other species for added support. In Fordlândia, however, the trees were planted close together in plantations, easy prey for tree blight, Saúva ants, lace bugs, red spiders, and leaf caterpillars.
Greg Grandin, whose father was a construction engineer in Fordlândia, enjoyed spending time with his father while he worked in Brazil. Within Grandin's book, The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City, he explains how "Ford had very particular understandings about what a proper diet should be … He tried to impose brown rice and whole-wheat bread and canned peaches and oatmeal — and that itself created discontent". The unfamiliar food, American-style housing, and other limitations were at minimum disliked. Additionally, workers felt the way they were treated inhumanly – being required work through the middle of the day under the tropical sun – often refusing to work out of concern that they would succumb to the heat and humidity of the Amazon Rainforest.
In 1930, the native workers grew tired of Ford's imposed diet in addition to a change with how the food was distributed and revolted in the town's cafeteria. This became known as the Breaking Pans (Portuguese: Quebra-Panelas). The rebels proceeded to cut the telegraph wires and chased away the managers and even the town's cook into the jungle for a few days until the Brazilian Army arrived and the revolt ended. Agreements were then made on the type of food the workers would be served.
A 2009 NPR article reported, "Not one drop of latex from Fordlândia ever made it into a Ford car". The government of Brazil was suspicious of any foreign investments, particularly in the northern Amazonian region, and offered little help. It was not long before the numerous problems began to take a toll on the project and the decision was made to relocate. Fordlândia was abandoned by the Ford Motor Company in 1934, and the project was relocated downstream to Belterra, 40 kilometres (25 mi) south of the city of Santarém, where better conditions to grow rubber existed. By 1945, synthetic rubber had been developed, reducing world demand for natural rubber. Ford's investment opportunity dried up overnight without producing any rubber for Ford's tires, and the second town was also abandoned. In 1945, Henry Ford's grandson Henry Ford II sold the area comprising both towns back to the Brazilian government for a loss of over US$20 million (equivalent to $349 million in 2024).
In spite of the huge investment and numerous invitations, Henry Ford never visited either of his ill-fated towns.
Between the 1950s and late 1970s, after being given back the rights to the lands, the Brazilian government, through its Ministry of Agriculture, installed several facilities in the area. The houses that once belonged to Ford's rubber tappers were then given to the families of the Ministry's employees, whose descendants still occupy them.
This project was also short-lived and left the city nearly completely abandoned upon reaching its end.
The town remained inhabited by roughly 90 people until the latter half of the 2000s. No basic services were offered in the area, with medical help only coming by boat at long intervals. That changed when people looking for places to live decided to go back into the town, often claiming houses. The town, now a district of Aveiro, was home to nearly 3,000 people as of 2017.
Most of the original buildings still stand, with the exception of the hospital, which was dismantled by looters.
Regarded as the symbol of Fordlândia, the 50-metre (160 ft) tall water tower is located by the main warehouses. As with most of the equipment in the town, it was built in Michigan and brought to Fordlândia by merchant ship. The water tower, water treatment plant and all of its original plumbing are still operational.
The hospital was left intact until the late 2000s, when looters completely dismantled the hospital and removed its contents.
Before being dismantled, a number of controversies occurred regarding the hospital's X-ray machines. As a local TV station reported, several marked boxes containing radioactive material were left behind. This generated fears of contamination among the population of nearby towns and cities, with people often mentioning the Goiânia accident, causing the authorities to remove the materials following an outcry.
The town had a sawmill responsible for providing lumber for all the construction around. The sawmill and kiln still stand; however, most equipment is gone.
The town's workshop was a three-story warehouse responsible for manufacturing parts for the machines working in the town. It still stands and has most of the original equipment. It is now used as a warehouse where most artifacts from Ford's era are kept. Hospital beds, equipment, a lead coffin and parts of an X-ray machine are stored in this warehouse.
The second floor of the warehouse was allowed to be used for the processing of seeds for a community project. The oil extracted from those seeds greatly accelerated the rotting of the wooden floor which has collapsed in some areas.
The six houses in the American Village still had their original furniture, silverware and even clothes that were left behind when the town was deserted. The houses were claimed by locals and most items were sold or taken as souvenirs. One of the houses was lost to a fire.