About the Program
Greg Grandin, history professor at New York University, recounts Henry Ford's creation of a factory town in the Amazon in 1927 to produce rubber. The town, Fordlandia, complete with movie theaters and Model Ts, was rejected by the indigenous population and abandoned by Ford in 1945. This event was hosted by the Strand Bookstore in New York City. Greg Grandin's Fordlandia was nominated for the 2009 National Book Award for Nonfiction.