Childe Wills

Childe Harold Wills (June 1, 1878 – December 30, 1940) was an American engineer and businessman. He was an early associate of Henry Ford, one of the first employees of the Ford Motor Company, and the chief contributor to the design of the Model T. After leaving Ford, he began his own automobile company, Wills Sainte Claire.

Early career Wills was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, in 1878, the youngest child of John C. and Angelina S. Wills. His first name Childe was taken from the poem Childe Harold's Pilgrimage by Lord Byron. Wills hated the name, however, and always went by his middle name Harold or his initials instead.

When Wills was 17, he began a four-year apprenticeship as a toolmaker at the Detroit Lubricator Company, where his father worked.

At Ford, Wills hired Peter E. Martin in 1903. He worked hand-in-hand with Ford on the early Ford models. When Ford planned mass production of cars, Wills saw the importance of lightweight, strong, nickel-chrome vanadium steel to the mass production process. Ford tasked Wills with determining how to produce the necessary quantities of steel. as well as (with his early interest in commercial art and calligraphy) the calligraphy of the script "Ford" logo that is still in use today. He had two sons with Mary: John Harold and Childe Harold Jr.

Although Ford and Wills began as friends, over time the relationship between the two grew frosty, an invention that supposedly occurred to Wills due to the number of fire hydrants he had accidentally backed into.

Wills went on to join Ruxton