the fight while on his way to a meeting with Ford. Ghers, a Hearst newspaper columnist who had credibility with the police, convinced them that Bennett was not at fault, so they released Bennett without charges. On the spur of the moment, Ghers decided to take Bennett along with him to see Ford. At the meeting, Ford was more interested in Bennett's prowess in the street fight than the business at hand, and he offered Bennett a security job at the Rouge plant. Bennett's interview for the job was reported to be short. He was asked only one question by Ford as to his capabilities. "Can you shoot?" asked Henry. He could. Bennett was known for talking and acting tough around the Ford plants. For target practice, Bennett would fire BB's from an air pistol at a small target mechanism on a filing cabinet in his basement office at the Rouge. Visitors and co-workers were puzzled by the muffled sounds of pellets striking the target. Bennett kept lions as pets at his Ann Arbor estate. He startled fellow executives by bringing the "big cats" to his office and painting images of them. "Harry Bennett used to sit at his desk, with his feet up on the desk, and a target at the other end of the room and fire a 45 target practice in his office and if someone was invited in to have a meeting with him they better make certain that his presence was properly announced or they may have intercepted one of those." Bennett soon recruited a collection of football players, boxers, wrestlers , and Detroit river gang members as Service Department employees. He knew nothing about making cars, but he did not need to. Bennett's close relationship with Henry Ford and his ability to get things done made him a success. All Henry had to do was ask, "Can you take care of that, Harry?" and it was done. Bennett was so loyal to Henry Ford that when a journalist asked Bennett during an interview, "If Henry Ford asked you to black out the sky tomorrow, what would you do?" Bennett thought for a moment and said, "I might have a little trouble arranging that one but you'd see 100,000 workers coming through the plant gates with dark glasses on tomorrow." In the mid-1920s, Bennett often drove to Ford's Fair Lane mansion to ask his boss