During the first few years of experimenting, before the engineers produced a car that would run in a reasonably satisfactory manner, the industry offered investors only what might have been called the inventor’s chance. These years were followed by a short period devoted to determining whether there was a market for the automobile.
During the time of experimenting and determining the market the average person could not be expected to become very enthusiastic over an investment in the industry. The average person has not clear vision in matters of this kind, and, lacking vision, he can not bring imagination to his aid.
And in those early days it required clear vision, good imagination and exceptional ability to reason from probability to fact to see the coming greatness of the automobile industry.
A few courageous men had this vision and this ability, and to them is due all credit for the establishing of the industry. In time others might have done it, but these men did it.
The making and marketing of automobiles that would run had but fairly begun when their popularity became so manifest that even an average person could see that the automobile industry was bound to become great and profitable.
Here, then, was an opportunity for scientific investment that was prodigious in possibilities.
Those who were intelligent enough to see it and progressive and courageous enough to avail themselves of it, and did so, today form another set of rich men.
Difficulty in Getting Capital.
The industry had great difficulty in getting capital. It was a new line, a new venture. Bankers and other “conservatives” could see nothing in it. They used their pet weapon of crying “speculation”, “hazard”, “risk”, and so on, to keep people from investing in it, and, of course, did not invest in it themselves, or aid it in any way to get started.
But since the beginning of this century, when the automobile industry began growing, many of our people have, among many other things, built the great automobile industry into what it is, and made money. Not only this, but they will build it still greater, and make still more money.