A walk through the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village in Dearborn, MI, is a walk through time. The museum offers a glance back not just at the industry that its namesake made into an American institution, but at the history of the country as seen through the lens of its means of conveyance and its technological dreams.

I took the stroll to see my favorites: the cars. Each is its own time capsule and a reminder of a world long past. There is something about a Model A that is still very satisfying. But, of course, it was another letter, on a different model, that got it all started. As I walked up to the Model T display I noticed that they had placed a wax figure of a man in the driver's seat — to make the display more plausible, I assume. I approached more closely and was pleasantly surprised to see that it resembled the late Henry Ford.

The air of history about the place and the stories of the company's past successes put me in a reflective mood. What would Henry Ford say about the state of things in the automotive industry? If he visited the factories of Ford, GM, and Toyota, would he be alarmed by what he saw and heard?

It is, after all, a dreary picture for an industry we once held dear. We've ceded dominance of domestic automotive sales to foreign competitors, and seen vast profits turned to wrenching losses. Where would Mr. Ford focus his disapproval? I imagine he would sanction the efforts of today's leaders to execute a turnaround, although I'm not sure he would agree with the strategies. Where I think he would find fault is with those who abandoned his American manufacturing methodology and recently chose to greatly favor SUVs and other fuel guzzlers in the face of a market that was shifting away from such products.

In his day, Henry Ford used to assign a man to each material or set of parts that entered the factory. Some even rode the coal cars. That may not be feasible today, but there should be no less emphasis on delivering components reliably and efficiently. It would doubtless be only a small satisfaction to Mr. Ford that the Japanese manufacturers have followed his good practices in manufacturing technique and supply methods, since, in so doing, they have had Ford and GM for a sushi lunch.

While the Toyota Production System represents a successful update of what Mr. Ford practiced, I imagine the word "irony" would spring to his mind in seeing what Ford's latter-day competitors have accomplished. When Henry Ford died in 1947, the Japanese were, at best, on their knees. But, instead of the beginning of their end, the post-WWII era was the genesis of their ascendancy. In the intervening years, as the world has gone global in auto manufacturing, the U.S. has devolved into a nation of consumers.

Henry Ford was born in 1863, two years before the termination of the Civil War. In America's current battles against automotive manufacturers far and wide, it may behoove us to remember that Henry Ford was born into those fractured times, only to emerge as an exemplar of American ingenuity and resourcefulness. Perhaps if he were here now, he would note that such traits still exist in this country, and that the foundations of tomorrow are often built on the ruins of today.