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Flint Michigan has been known as the "Vehicle City" since the late 1800's. There were three major
Horse-Drawn Carriage manufacturers in the late 1800's, and by 1900 they were producing over 100,000 carriages
a year. The most successful Carriage producer, Durant - Dort Carriage Co. was run by partners
William "Billy" Durant, and J. Dallas Dort. The enterprising Billy Durant was intrigued by this new
fangled contraption known as the Horse-less Carriage, and thought, hmm maybe we should try this Horse-less
Carriage thing. And the rest, as they say, is history.
General Motors was incorporated on September 16, 1908. At it's inception, Buick
was the only Motor Company in G.M., Oldsmobile was added later that year. By 1920 G.M. had bought
over 30 companies. A quick foot note, up until the 1920's there were nearly 1,000 companies making Motor
Vehicles. Under200 companies survived, and those that did survive most struggled financially. (A lot of the financial problems were do to a Stock Market panic 1907.) That made it easy for Billy
Durant to buy up companies to build his Automotive Empire.
In G.M.'s first full year of production it sold 25,000 Cars and Trucks, generating $29
Million. By 1910 G.M's sales were on a decline and was losing money. It was the opinion of some of G.M.'s finance people
that the Company grew too fast, Durant bought too many Companies. To prevent the financial collapse of G.M., a group of bankers
were forced to intervine. Billy Durant lost control of General Motors, the Company hefounded.
After losing control of G.M. Billy Durant teamed up with race car driver Louis
Chevrolet. Together they began the Chevrolet Motor Co.which became very successful. The success of Chevrolet
enabled Billy Durant to regain control of G.M. in 1915. Chevrolet was brought into the G.M. fold shortly
there - after.
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