Employee Housing, Fordlandia, Brazil, June 1932

In 1928, Ford Motor Company established Fordlandia, a 2.5 million-acre rubber plantation and industrial town, in the Amazon Rainforest. Native workers rioted two years later against imposed American work rules and behavioral restrictions. To alleviate tensions, Ford began building new housing and other amenities. The building designs, however, were patterned after management's Midwestern American aesthetics -- inappropriate for Brazil's tropical climate.