Farewell To General Motors

Jake Venter takes a walk down memory lane in a tribute to ‘The General’, as GM pulls out of SA.

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The news that General Motors (GM) is withdrawing from SA has been received with sadness by many who fondly remember the great cars produced by the company not just in years gone by, but also in more recent times.

GM’s history in our country goes back to 1913, when GMSA was founded, initially to distribute fullybuilt Chevrolet cars imported from North America. In 1926, manufacturing operations started in the company’s plant in Port Elizabeth, and eventually the range of vehicles marketed included all the marques in the GM stable: the Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick, and Cadillac from the US; Vauxhall from the UK; Opel from Germany; and Holden from Australia.

While the Ford Model T outsold Chevrolet three to one in 1926, Chevy’s sales sky-rocketed to just over a million units in 1927, and GM became the largest car manufacturer in the world.

The company was often referred to as ‘The General’, and was the first to introduce:

• A battery-powered ignition system using a contact breaker, coil and distributor, which first featured on the 1910 Cadillac.

• The self-starter, first featured on the 1912 Cadillac.

• A fully synchronised manual transmission in 1928.