Toyota’s roots lie in Sakichi Toyoda’s 1924 Model G automatic loom, which halted itself whenever a thread broke, a principle called jidoka. In 1929 the British firm Platt Brothers bought the patent rights, and Sakichi gave the money to his son Kiichiro Toyoda to build a car. Kiichiro set up an automobile division inside the loom works in 1933, built the Type A engine in 1934, launched the G1 truck in 1935 as the government favored trucks, and completed the Model AA passenger car in 1936. After a public logo contest, brother-in-law Risaburo Toyoda changed the spelling from Toyoda to Toyota, written in eight strokes with a crisper sound, and Toyota Motor Company was incorporated in August 1937.

Bombers struck the Koromo plant a day before Japan’s surrender, and the 1949 stabilization program left the company insolvent; the Bank of Japan’s rescue split manufacturing from sales and forced layoffs, and Kiichiro resigned in 1950. He died in March 1952 before the Toyopet Crown prototypes were finished; the Crown sold well in Japan from 1955 but failed in the US in 1958. Cousin Eiji Toyoda studied Ford’s River Rouge plant and combined jidoka with just-in-time production, Kiichiro’s son Shoichiro reunited sales and manufacturing in 1982, the NUMMI venture with General Motors opened in Fremont in 1984, and grandson Akio Toyoda took over in 2009.

• The family name translates to fertile rice paddies, and the new spelling distanced the carmaker from farming and looms.
• Laws restricting foreign automakers in Japan shielded the young company from Ford and GM.
• After the war Toyota kept going partly by repairing damaged US military vehicles.
• American sales staff warned that the Toyopet name suggested toys, which break.
• During the recall crisis Akio Toyoda drove recalled models and testified before Congress, following genchi genbutsu, go and see for yourself.