To be a bit more precise, the MEL division was announced on January 15, 1958 according to C. Gayle Warnock in "The Edsel Affair" page 222. The first Edsel technical bulletin issued with "MEL Division" in the header was January 23, 1958, but I have a sales report dated February 10 from the Edsel Division Planning and Programming Department hand-written on August 1957 form ED-7172, "ED" indicating this was an Edsel Division-produced form. In contrast, the February 1958 sales report came from the Sales Statistics and Analysis Department hand-written on October 1957 form S-3064o, evidently from the recently reformed Lincoln-Mercury Division. The first Sales Report in my collection that actually bears the name "M-E-L" is dated April 24,1958. "M-E-L DIVISION" is typed in the lower left-hand corner.
Despite the apparent gradual nature of the operations change, the third full week of January 1958 can probably be cited as a reasonably accurate point in time for the formation of the MEL Division.
A building at Oakwood Blvd. and the new freeway (later to become I-94) using the mailing address 3000 Schaefer Road was Edsel Division headquarters starting, I believe, in late summer of 1956 but at that time it was still known as the Special Products Division, since the naming of the car wouldn't be announced until November. Previous to that, the building was the Continental (not Lincoln) Division Headquarters.
Question: Could this have been Lincoln-Mercury headquarters before it was Continental headquarters? i wonder if Gunnell cited any sources or kept any records of that in the course of his research.
In 1955 and 1956 Ford, Lincoln, Mercury, Edsel and Continental were all separate divisions of the Ford Motor Company. Lincoln Division Headquarters in actuality were located at the new Novi Township assembly plant, later known as "Wixom" about 20 miles northwest of Dearborn. Not sure where Mercury was headquartered.
In 1958, the same building and the shop facilities directly behind it became a Ford pilot production facility sometimes referred to as the "Allen Park plant" where assembly line production equipment and operations were developed and tested. At least one photo exists of a 1959 Ford being assembled using what looks to be an assembly-line hoist, except there is no assembly line under the car. The personnel tending to the task are in white lab coats, and the photo is believed to have been taken inside that very same Allen Park facility that today bears the address 17000 Oakwood Blvd. Since the facility was meant to test production methods, the jigs and hoists were meant for full production, but the car assemblies were wheeled about on carts rather than on assembly line conveyors. The facility still operates today in essentially the same capacity.
BTW, compare the appearance of this building to the front of the Louisville assembly plant. It's been noted that this was a design that was used repeatedly for Ford facilities all over the world. It was easily expanded to two wings either side of the center entrance.
Shortly after the Edsel Division was absorbed into Lincoln-Mercury Division, it moved to the existing Lincoln-Mercury Division headquarters in the old Ford World Headquarters building (built in 1928) directly across Schaefer Road from the Rotunda. It appears this building had already been serving as a mailing address for multiple FoMoCo facilities in the area, hence the confusion on the physical location of these various sites. That same old building on Schaefer Road later served as Ford Parts and Accessories Division headquarters which subsequently became Ford Customer Service Division. The building was razed in 1997.
gauss
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