To most Americans, the phrase "built like a Mack truck" conveys a feeling of strength and solidity. Founded by three machinist-blacksmiths and wagonmakers in 1900, Mack Trucks, Inc. made the first gas-driven bus (for sightseeing in Brooklyn's Prospect Park), the first motor-driven hook & ladder. Mack soon became the leader in the heavy truck industry; year after year its earnings were good, its dividends fat. But in 1949 the oldest truckmaker in the U.S. no longer seemed to be built like a Mack. Sales were well down from 1947's peacetime peak of $124...
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