Copyediting sample 41:
Ford, DeSoto, and then Chevrolet

In this memoir, I addressed redundancies and problems of coherence. I also raised a question (about DeSoto’s engine) that the author needed to address.

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Original
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In 1928, Grandpa Blade sold the La Conner Ford agency. My dad told me that in the mid-1920s, the Henry Ford was pursuing at least two policies with his dealers that offended my grandfather. First, every Ford dealer was required to purchase a quota of new Fordson tractors for to sell alongside Model Ts. My grandfather objected to the mandatory nature of the program and the Fordson was probably unprofitable in the quantities that Ford required him to accept and of course then had to sell. The second policy my grandfather found distasteful was Ford’s dictate that every dealer purchase and distribute Henry Ford’s virulently anti-Semitic Dearborn Independent newspaper. In 1927 Walter Chrysler announced the new 1928 DeSoto automobile. Grandpa sold the Ford garage in La Conner to a brother-in-law, my great uncle Francis Jensen, and Grandpa opened a DeSoto dealership in downtown Mount Vernon, nine miles east of La Conner. At that time, La Conner had a population of only around 500 people, and Mount Vernon had a population of about 3,500, so the relocation offered a much larger potential customer base. Within a year, an unsuccessful Chevrolet dealership in Mount Vernon became available. Grandpa Blade saw selling Chevrolet’s to be a better opportunity than selling DeSoto’s. Grandpa recognized that the purchase of the Chevrolet dealership and the concurrent introduction of the 1929 Chevrolet six-cylinder engine, while the Ford remained a four-cylinder, was an opportunity. "A Six for the Price of a Four" was Chevrolet’s pitch, and it proved successful. With few exceptions, Chevrolet outsold Ford for the next 50 years. The move from Ford in La Conner to DeSoto and then Chevrolet in Mount Vernon certainly greatly impacted our family’s future.

Markup
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In 1928, Grandpa Blade sold the La Conner Ford agency. My dad told me that in the mid-1920s, the Henry Ford Henry Ford was pursuing at least two policies with his dealers that offended my grandfather. First, every Ford dealer was required to purchase a quota of new Fordson tractors for to sell tractors to sell alongside Model Ts. My grandfather objected to the mandatory nature of the program and program, and the Fordson was probably unprofitable in the quantities that Ford required him to accept and of course then and, of course, then had to sell. [I got rid of the paragraph break here.] The second policy my grandfather found distasteful was Ford’s dictate that every dealer purchase and distribute Henry Ford’s virulently anti-Semitic Dearborn Independent newspaper. [I broke the paragraph here.] In 1927 Walter Chrysler announced 1927, Walter Chrysler had announced the new 1928 DeSoto automobile. Grandpa sold In the ensuing year, after Grandpa sold the Ford garage in La Conner to a brother-in-law, my great uncle my great-uncle Francis Jensen, and Grandpa Jensen, he opened a DeSoto dealership in downtown Mount Vernon, nine miles east of La Conner. [Revision to address a redundancy with the preceding paragraph (and to preserve chronological order)] At that time, La Conner had a population of only around 500 people, and Mount Vernon had a population of about 3,500, so the relocation offered a much larger potential customer base. Within a year, an unsuccessful Chevrolet dealership in Mount Vernon became available. Grandpa Blade saw selling Chevrolet’s to be a better realized that selling Chevrolets was a better opportunity than selling DeSoto’s. Grandpa recognized that the purchase of the Chevrolet dealership and the concurrent introduction of the 1929 Chevrolet six-cylinder engine, while the Ford remained a four-cylinder, was an opportunity. DeSotos, especially considering the concurrent introduction of the 1929 Chevrolet six-cylinder engine, while the Ford’s engine remained a four-cylinder. [(1) Revision to eliminate redundancy. (2) Did the DeSoto have only four cylinders?] "A Six for the Price of a Four" “A Six for the Price of a Four” was Chevrolet’s pitch, and it proved successful. With few exceptions, Chevrolet outsold Ford for the next 50 fifty years. The move from Ford in La Conner to DeSoto and then Chevrolet in Mount Vernon certainly greatly impacted our family’s future.

Result
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In 1928, Grandpa Blade sold the La Conner Ford agency. My dad told me that in the mid-1920s, Henry Ford was pursuing at least two policies with his dealers that offended my grandfather. First, every Ford dealer was required to purchase a quota of new Fordson tractors to sell alongside Model Ts. My grandfather objected to the mandatory nature of the program, and the Fordson was probably unprofitable in the quantities that Ford required him to accept and, of course, then had to sell. The second policy my grandfather found distasteful was Ford’s dictate that every dealer purchase and distribute Henry Ford’s virulently anti-Semitic Dearborn Independent newspaper. In 1927, Walter Chrysler had announced the new 1928 DeSoto automobile. In the ensuing year, after Grandpa sold the Ford garage in La Conner to a brother-in-law, my great-uncle Francis Jensen, he opened a DeSoto dealership in downtown Mount Vernon, nine miles east of La Conner. At that time, La Conner had a population of only around 500 people, and Mount Vernon had a population of about 3,500, so the relocation offered a much larger potential customer base. Within a year, an unsuccessful Chevrolet dealership in Mount Vernon became available. Grandpa Blade realized that selling Chevrolets was a better opportunity than selling DeSotos, especially considering the concurrent introduction of the 1929 Chevrolet six-cylinder engine, while the Ford’s engine remained a four-cylinder. (The 1929 DeSoto also had a six-cylinder engine, but the Chevrolet dealership’s Mount Vernon location was the deciding factor.) “A Six for the Price of a Four” was Chevrolet’s pitch, and it proved successful. With few exceptions, Chevrolet outsold Ford for the next fifty years. The move from Ford in La Conner to DeSoto and then Chevrolet in Mount Vernon certainly greatly impacted our family’s future.