Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor stopped auto manufacturing with shift to war production

82nd Anniversary of Japanese attack on Pearl

Harbor, bringing American into WWII, offers

a reminder of the incredible levels of

manufacturing in America to meet the 

emergency.

In 1942, Chevrolet produced the most automobiles in the United States with 254,885 vehicles manufactured. Ford built 160,432 that year. But these numbers were down drastically from the year before.

In 1941, Chevrolet built 1,008,976 autos. Ford built 691,455. Plymouth built 522,080, Buick 374,196, Pontiac 330,061, Oldsmobile 270,040, Dodge 215,575 and Chrysler 161,704. But, if the 1942 numbers were down, they were nothing compared to the numbers of vehicles built by American auto manufacturers in the years 1943, 1944 and 1945.

For those three years the only data is for war production; there were no automobiles built those years. To understand why, we need to look back to the tail end of 1941. In particular, we need to look to Dec. 7, 1941 and an event that took place that day that changed everything.

That event was the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that plunged America into WWII.

After honoring veterans on Veterans Day a few weeks ago, consider the impact of WWII on auto manufacturing

If you’re assuming that auto manufacturers simply took the war years off, that wasn’t really the case. Instead, American auto manufacturers were part of an incredible program where they retooled from building cars to building the weapons those veterans needed at the time to fight tyranny around the world.

As the chart above shows, when America switched from peace-time production, including
automobiles, the country virtually built more aircraft than the rest of the world combined.
Auto manufacturers, including Ford, GM and Chrysler played a major role in war production 
but consumers would have to wait until after the war for the latest models of cars.

Ford built an entire plant in Willow Run, Michigan, to turn out B-24 four-engine bombers (the most mass-produced airplane in history). Cadillac and Chrysler built tanks. Buick built airplane engines. Auto manufacturers made shells, propellers, machine guns, military trucks and more.

The “Arsenal of Democracy,” as then Pres. Franklin Delano Roosevelt called American industry, cranked up for the war beyond anything anyone could have imagined.

In 1940, the U.S. manufactured 1,771 military combat aircraft. By 1942, that number jumped to 24,669 and, by 1944, 74,564. From 1940 through 1945, the U.S. built 200,443 military aircraft. The country also built 95,516 military support aircraft.

Auto manufacturers switched to war production

when the country entered WWII and provided

a wide array of the tools to defend democracy.

Here, auto manufacturers produce Sherman

Tanks.

In 1940, the U.S. built exactly 6 medium tanks and 359 light tanks. From 1940 through 1945, manufacturers in the U.S. turned out 23,119 light tanks and 68,846 medium tanks. On top of that, the country was still able to produce another 2,202 heavy M26 Pershing tanks.

When the war ended, America’s auto manufacturers went right back to building automobiles for American consumers. In 1946, Ford manufactured 468,422 automobiles. Chevrolet built 398,028, Plymouth made 264,660 and Dodge made 163,490. By 1949, Ford and Chevrolet both manufactured more than one-million automobiles. 

In 2016, in the days prior to The Pandemic, vehicle production in North America rose to more than 18 million. We’ve come a long way from the days before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor but we wouldn’t have come anywhere at all if not for the veterans who used the weapons built by American industry in response to the emergency.