The Flivver King Chapter 2 Summary & Analysis

Abner’s father, Tom Shutt, works in a factory making railway freight-cars. For this skilled work, Tom makes $1.40 a day, and he always comes home exhausted. The Shutts live on one side of a two-family frame house; they are poor, but not hopeless. They share many Americans’ beliefs that their children will be able to rise in the world and that opportunity is available to everyone.

Here, Sinclair establishes that even the poor characters in the novel have faith in the quintessential American Dream—the idea that they can have freedom, prosperity, security, equal opportunity, and social mobility.

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One evening, while Ford is working on his invention, Abner introduces him to Tom. Ford is 28, lean, and intelligent, and he tells Abner and Tom that he plans to make the carriages on a mass scale so that anyone will be able to drive to work in one. People will be able to save a lot of money by driving themselves. Tom politely wishes Ford luck, but privately he doesn’t believe that Ford will be able to carry out his visions.

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Ford demonstrates his idealism as he builds his first car: he wants to be able to provide Americans with something useful that will save them money in the long run. In this way, Ford not only displays his optimism but also demonstrates the potential benefits of new technology on a broad scale.

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The Flivver King: Chapter 2 Summary & Analysis