Ford's Assembly line

It is hard for modern people to imagine the life one hundred years ago. No television, no plastic, no ATMs, no DVDs. Illnesses like tuberculosis, diphtheria, pneumonia meant only death. Of course, cloning appeared only in science fiction. Not to mention, computer and Internet.

对于一百年前的生活，今天的人们是很难想象的。没有电视、没有塑料、没有自动提款机、没有DVD。一些像肺结核、白喉和肺炎这样的病是死亡的代名词。当然，人们只在有科幻小说里才会见得到克隆。更不用说电脑和互联网了。

Today, our workplace are equipped with assembly lines, fax machines, computers. Our daily life is cushioned by air conditioners, cell phones. Antiobitics helped created a long list of miracle drugs. The bypass operation saved millions. The discovery of DNA has revolutionized the way scientists think about new therapies. Man finally stepped on the magical and mysterious Moon. With the rapid changes we have been experiencing, the anticipation for the future is higher than ever.

一百年以后的今天，在上班时，我们有装配流水线、传真机、电脑。空调、手机使我们的日常生活变得安逸。抗生素的发现使一大批能创造生命奇迹的药得以面世；心脏搭摄手术救活了数以百万计的生命；DNA的发现使科学家对治疗方法的认识发生了翻天覆地的变化。人类终于登上了魅力无穷、神秘莫测的月球。随着科学技术的迅猛发展，人类对未来怀有前所未有的憧憬。

A revoluntionary manufacturing process made it possible for anyone to own a car. Henry Ford, the man who put the world on wheels.

一种革命性的制造程序使几乎每个人都能拥有一辆小汽车。亨利·福特给世界装上了轮子。

When it comes to singling out those who have made a difference in all our lives, you cannot overlook Henry Ford. A historian a century from now might well conclude that it was Henry Ford who most influenced all manufacturing. Everywhere, even to this day, by introducing a new way to make cars – one, strange to say, that originated in slaughter-houses.

如果要挑选出那些对我们所有人的生活都产生过影响的人物来，就不能忽略亨利·福特。从现在起100年后的一位历史学家很可能会得出这样的结论：对各个地方一切制造业产生影响最大的是福特，甚至直到今天依然如此，因为他开始采用了一种新的制造汽车的方法——奇怪的是这种方法起源于屠宰场。

Back in the early 1900s, slaughterhouses used what could have been called a “dis-assembly line.” That is. The carcass of a slain steer or a pig was moved past various meat-cutters, each of whom cut off only a certain portion. Ford reversed this process to see if it would speed up production of a part of an automobile engine called a magneto. Rather than have each worker completely assemble a magneto, one of its elements was placed on a conveyer, and each worker, as it passed, added another component to it. The same one each time. Professor David Hounshell, of The University of Delaware , an expert on industrial development tells what happened:

在本世纪初，屠宰场所使用的可以称为“拆卸线”，即将一头宰好的牛体或猪体从很多切肉工人面前移动经过，每一个切肉工人只割下特定的某个部分。福特将这一过程颠倒过来，试试是否会加速汽车上一个叫做磁石发电机的部件的生产。不让每个工人组装一台完整的磁石发电机，而是将发电机的一个部件放在传送带上，在它经过时，每个工人都给它添装上一个部件，每次都装配同样的一个部件。特拉华大学教授戴维·亨谢尔是工业发展专家，他谈起当时的情况：liuxuepaper.com