Emeline King

Emeline King (born December 16, 1957) is an American industrial designer, known for her automotive designs. In 1983, she was hired by Ford Motor Company, and became the first Black woman designer for the automobile manufacturer.King also works as a motivational speaker, musician, and author. She authored an autobiography, "What Do You Mean A Black Girl Can't Design? Emeline King, She Did It" (2021, Claire Aldin Pub.)

Quotes

• It all started at the age of 11, introduced me to his coworkers and I noticed a set of blue doors. When I tried to open the door my dad told me I couldn’t go behind them because I wasn’t an employee and behind those doors were men and they were called ‘transportation designers. They designed every car that you saw going up the road.
• “I was so intrigued in hearing that, I decided that I wanted to become a car designer and I wanted to work at Ford designing cars
• I was attending Keidan Elementary School and we would have ‘show and tell.’ I bought my car made out of clay and I would draw pictures of cars and such but it was my male teacher who told me that because I was a girl, I couldn’t design cars.
• He didn’t know my father was my big mentor. He introduced me to this world and I was being mentored from all angles.”
• From the time I was hired on Oct. 24, 1983 until I was let go in 2008, I was largely the only female car designer at the company. I was doing all this work but I was not getting promoted. I was watching Ford hire male designers and seeing them get promoted. They even started hiring female designers that were getting promoted before me,”
• “I knew I had to come up with something different. So I said, ‘Okay, I’m gonna start thinking about females and how they design things and take into account things women would want in a car.
• “If I’m on this project, I will make sure it is designed with women in mind. So all the features were catered to a more broad audience. It was still going to stay a muscle car but it’s just going to have more of a soft touch