The Lean Enterprise Institute has created a graphical timeline called “Breakthrough Moments in Lean” that lets you glimpse the salient developments in lean thinking, beginning with the floating assembly line for ships at the Venetian Arsenal in the 1500s, through the contributions of Henry Ford and the Toyoda family in the early 1900s, to the modern diffusion of lean.
See the lean timeline by clicking on the link below:
http://www.lean.org/WhatsLean/timeline.cfm