In 1880 when E.G. Kingsford was 18 years old, he moved from Canada to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and started a career in logging, timber sales, and eventually real estate. Within ten years he had married, and his new bride’s cousin was an employee of the Edison Illuminating Company named Henry Ford. The two struck up a friendship, hunting and fishing in Northern Michigan.
His personal relationship with Ford led Kingsford to becoming the only authorized distributor of Ford automobiles in the U.P. and Northern Wisconsin in 1908. A township in the shadow of Iron Mountain that he’d developed for the Ford Motor Company included a Ford factory that at its peak employed 7000 people. It had been colloquially called “Kingsford” until it was official incorporated after Kingsford’s death.
In 1919, on an annual camping trip with Thomas Edison, Ford asked Kingsford to produce the lumber needed for the Model T, which was already the most popular model of automobile at the time, having surpassed a million cars sold that same year. While the body panels on early automobiles may have been steel, they were mounted on wooden frames. Ford thought it would improve efficiency (and drop the price of the car) if he were producing his own timber.
Kingsford set out to build Ford the lumber mills he would need to wrest power away from shareholders who weren’t interested in lowering the price on their most popular car. By 1921 the cost of a Model T had dropped from over $800 to $325, in part because Kingsford had established the Michigan Iron, Land and Lumber Company for Ford, and began producing lumber direct to the assembly line from its brand-new mills.
Eventually Ford was upset to discover all the wood by-products that are scrapped at a lumber plant. It was estimated to cost the company $11,000 a day to throw away 400 tons of sawdust and chippings. A chemist named Orin Stafford was tasked by Ford to invent a type of new fuel to try and extract some value from the waste. Stafford had already developed a wood distillation process for the company for extracting usable chemicals from the wood waste, but came up with a lump of sawdust, tar, and cornstarch that Ford licensed. It was very similar to other charcoal briquettes that had been patented since 1895.
Edison and Kingsford established an adjacent factory to the lumber mill that turned sawdust into the familiar “pillow” shaped charcoal briquette you know today. For every ton of scrap that entered the “Carbonization Building,” Ford could eke out 135 pounds of acetate lime, 61 gallons of wood alcohol, 15 gallons of tar, 600 cubic feet of fuel gas used to power the surrounding plants… and 610 pounds of charcoal briquettes. At its peak, the lumber plant produced 100 tons of lump charcoal.
Henry Ford, the most efficient man of the 20th Century, shortened the word “briquette” to “briquet,” and sold it mostly to meat and fish smokehouses. In the 1930s the Ford Charcoal Company was selling charcoal briquets exclusively at Ford Motor Company dealerships.
They began marketing small tabletop-style charcoal grills at a cost of $1, $2 and $3. There was the “Hunter’s Heater”: a quart can (like what was used for motor oil) filled with briquets. The idea was that you use a can opener to cut vents into it, light the charcoal, and heat your campsite with it. The Ford “Picnic Kit” was a way to encourage new motorists purchasing a Ford to also try some outdoor adventuring, like camping. Packaging touted “Sizzling broiled meats, steaming coffee, toasted sandwiches.”
National distribution through Ford dealerships was a far more successful way to encourage the idea of using charcoal, something that had failed to catch on in past decades. Sales were slow during the Depression, but when barbecuing became a popular backyard activity amidst the fuel rationing of World-War-II, charcoal grilling gained in popularity. Kingsford charcoal paired up with a Weber grill became a regular addition to every middle-class American’s lifestyle.
In 1951, after the death of Henry Ford, the Ford Charcoal Company was sold and renamed Kingsford. Although Edward Kingsford did not actually own any part of the briquette business, he still became the man behind the name. He passed away in 1943, just a few months after his wife of 53 years.
The Kingsford brand is still processing about a million tons of scrap wood into charcoal briquets annually.
Bring Dad to Porter’s Grilled!
Saturday, June 20, the 4th Annual Porter’s Grilled event kicks off at 11 am at Porter’s in Riverton. The “Grilled” competition starts at 12:30 pm. and features three champion BBQ chefs competing for Best Burger.
Until 3 p.m. the Grilled event includes bouncy houses, a ducky spa, face painting, a dunk tank, and of course, hamburgers and hot dogs! It’s family-fun time at Porter’s location on 750 E Sunset Drive this Saturday, so you won’t want to miss it.
Don’t forget to enter the #WhatsGrillin contest!
This year there’s no photo needed, no purchase required—just some good old-fashioned summer fun! All it takes is a quick entry with a few fun questions and you’re in the running to win big from Porter’s. Winners will be drawn on Saturday, June 20 during Porter’s GRILLED Event in Riverton (but don’t worry, you don’t have to be there to win!).
