Ford came very near crashing OTL. Had Henry been a bit more stubborn, & stayed in charge....
There's another option, tho: does this give Edsel the edge to force Henry out? If it does, you might see a very different FoMoCo arise.
Recall, Edsel was in his day a bit like Shelby, with a strong preference for performance & good looks. It was Edsel who conceived the Zephyr, which looked great & had the V12. A new *Ford could make Lincolns & Zephyrs with great styling & high performance (maybe Ardun hemi V8s, instead of the flatty, & maybe hemi V12s instead of the OTL flathead, too, but certainly V8s & V12s), leaving the bottom of the market to Willys, Chevy, & (if it isn't butterflied away by the growth of Willys) Plymouth. You might see Plymouth & Desoto never happen.
If this means *Ford goes after Buick, LaSalle, Chrysler, & Cadillac...

What eventually happens is anybody's guess. It might even influence Packard's pricing of the 120, so it's aimed more at Cad & Lincoln than Buick...which could (just) save Packard.
Would Edsel be inclined to buy Cord? Or hire Buehrig & build the Cord 810/812 as a Zephyr?



(The very idea of an 810 with a blown hemi V12...







)
Without Ford, is there room for Graham & Hudson to survive the '30s?
Without Henry being in charge, does FoMoCo get into war production sooner? Does Ford in the early '50s not do the price cuts that helped kill off the surviving independent carmakers?
Does Edsel send a team to win Le Mans before the '60s?

Does the AC Ace get an Ardun hemi V8 sooner (maybe just the 136ci "65hp", thanks to Britain's nutty RAC hp laws

), as a Ford Europe model?
Does TheMann have any opinions?
