The Car that put SA (and much of the world) on the road

By LEO KRITZINGER

SOUTH AFRICA'S love affair with Ford motor cars didn't start with the Model T, but rather five years earlier in 1903 with the T's predecessor when a Johannesburg businessman, Arthur Youldon, walked down Broadway, New York and spotted a young Henry Ford demonstrating his first production car in a dealer showroom -- a Model A. Youldon was so impressed, he gladly paid the hefty sum of $850 and had the car shipped to SA. This apparently was Ford's first export order. For many years this little 8 hp two-cylinder runabout was the only Ford in the Union -- today this rare historical piece of American Africana resides in the Franschhoek Motor Museum.