Ford’s factories combined manufacturing methods into moving assembly-line production in 1913, lowering Model T prices. He did not invent the car or achieve this alone. His promotion of antisemitism, documented by The Henry Ford museum, is a serious harm in any appraisal.

The long industrial legacy puts him above Bezos here; that harm weakens, rather than cancels from discussion, his claim to greatness. Gates wins second for a more adaptable software platform. If social harm is disqualifying, leave Ford out; production success cannot excuse it.

Sources: Production · Antisemitism.

Photo: Fred Hartsook · Public domain. Resized/compressed; source status retained.