Flint remembers GM's glory with parade marking 100th anniversary

[Faygo Kid]

Source: Detroit News

. . . The parade up and down bricked Saginaw Street capped a week of festivities in Flint -- GM's birthplace. Like the company, Flint has suffered from job losses, plant closings and urban decay in recent decades as shifting consumer tastes, global competition, rising energy costs and environmental concerns take a toll on southeast Michigan's auto industry.

Just last week, GM unveiled more drastic plans to downsize, including North American plant closings, white-collar layoffs and the elimination of health insurance for salaried retirees 65 and older. In a major blow, GM shareholders will no longer receive a dividend. The cuts will hurt communities such as Flint, where GM employment peaked at more than 80,000 in the later 1970s, especially hard.

But many of the hundreds of Flint-area residents put aside GM's staggering financial woes and relived the automaker's glorious, innovative past -- from tail fins to America's first sports car, the Corvette, to the muscle-car era and the latest gasoline-electric hybrids. . .

. . . "It is sad to see the condition of GM today. Flint needed a day and parade like this to pump up the community's spirits."

Read more: http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080720/AUTO03/807200326

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I have nothing but good things to say about Flint. The sit-down strike gave America its middle class, in so many ways. I sat with Michael Moore in downtown Flint long ago when the first reviews of "Roger and Me" came in from New York. My grandmother moved there after WWII and opened a restaurant, and my uncle lived there many years. I have more, but the bottom line is, I have roots in Flint.

Flint is America. Its strengths and weaknesses. It's not Bush country, and thank God for that.

[Bluzmann57]

1. Good for Flint

Keep on buying the Japanese made cars as well as German cars and just watch while the USA sinks. GM made many mistakes but one would hope that the company is smart enough to make gas efficient cars and/or alt fuel cars and thus rebound. Please buy American made vehicles and support American Union workers.

[MindMatter]

10. GM fought that every step of the way. Sucks for Flint, but mistakes have consequences

t should be obvious to anybody with an IQ anywhere near triple digits that it was a really lousy strategy for the companies we used to call the "Big 3" to fight every attempt to improve fuel efficiency standards. A 10th grader with a couple weeks of Economics under his belt could work out that a smarter strategy would be to embrace aggressive fuel economy standards in exchange for the government helping fund the necessary R&D, which could easily have been negotiated. This would have but each of the Detroit manufacturers on an even footing with their local competitors and would have give all three of them an advantage on the foreign manufacturers.

There probably aren't any people living in Flint who had much input on those decisions, so it is sad to see how those bad decisions can take a whole city down.

At this point, I wouldn't waste another nickel of Federal money on the Detroit car companies. I'd much rather see Federal investment go to American companies who are really trying to build an exciting, green future. Maybe one of them will eventually do some production in Flint.

[AndyTiedye]

12. One Would Hope

I had high hopes for GM when they came out with the EV1.
By the time I could actually afford one, GM had repossessed them all and sent them to the crusher. :grr:
As soon as the ZEV mandate was rescinded, GM wanted those electric cars GONE!
They also discontinued all their reasonably fuel-efficient Saturns and replaced them with rebadged Chevys.

We hope against hope that GM is getting a clue. They say the Volt is coming Real Soon Now.

In the meanwhile, would we please buy all these Hummers and Suburbans that are sitting there rusting on the dealer lots.
I'll have to pass. Let me know when I can test-drive the Volt.

Ford at least had enough of a clue to build the Escape Hybrid. We own one.
Odd that we cannot find an American *car* that is at least as frugal.

[knitter4democracy]

13. Have you been to Michigan lately?

What Japanese cars? There really aren't that many on the road here compared to anywhere else in the country I've been. We do buy America here, and we're a Ford family.

[marmar]

2. I lived in Grand Blanc and worked in Flint for five years.....

.... and in so many ways it is America. And it's really tragic to see what's going on right now. Michigan the state is hurting badly, and nowhere is the hurt more evident than Genesee County.

As Flint goes.....

[Faygo Kid]

3. There is no finer state than Michigan, and no city more emblematic of USA than Flint.

I'm so sorry to see the tailspin that Flint has been in for the past 35 years.

At least it has Crossroads Village, which is wonderful. AutoWorld was - not so hot.

[marmar]

4. I remember driving up from Detroit with my parents to visit AutoWorld....

.... and my first reaction was, "Can we turn around and go to Cedar Point?"....

And yes, the choo-choo at Crossroads is cool.

[JonLP24]

9. Yes, Flint has a lot of history

From being one of the known communities inhabitated in Michigan, to WWII, to the rise of boom. It is going thru redevelopment from what I know.

[whathappened]

5. flint

was born and raised in flushing a town just out side of flint , worked for buick for 15yr. , no more buick in flint , flint is dieing fast , u of m is the only thing flint has left , so sad , when i was a young boy we always went to flint for a day of shopping and fun , use to have amusment parks , coney dogs were the best , father work for buick 37 yr. befor retireing , so yes there is some good times to remeber from the days of flint , good bye flint , it was good knowing ya

[Faygo Kid]

6. Those are some deep roots.

I spent all my summers as a kid on a lake at the family cottage outside of Lapeer, so I know Flint and Flushing very well.

I spent a lot of time in Flint in the late 80s - early '90s. No finer people have I ever met or worked with.

[az chela]

8. Did you go to Fenton lake???I loved it there

Northern Michigan is one of the best places in the us
I loved Frankenmuth,Macinac island the Sioux locks,Ludington,Traverse City,Holland.I could go on forever

[az chela]

7. Hey I grew up in Flushing !!!!

My dad owned a hardware store there on Main Street for many years

[Grinchie]

11. I would have liked to see the flatbed loaded with Crushed EV1's lead the parade.

With all of the executives who made that decision walking in front of the truck, ultimately being crushed themselves under the wheels of the vehicle.

Who Killed the Electric Car???

See the movie, you'll be enraged, unless you are an oilman.

[knitter4democracy]

14. I can just imagine how some people there felt.

That would be like Kalamazoo doing something for all the paper mills that have left or the carpet mills. Just begging for parody.

Thing is, our state is dying, and there's nowhere else I'd rather live. Michigan is amazing and has all sorts of resources, but we barely register on the national level anymore. If it hadn't been for Michigan, we couldn't have won WWII with all of the tanks and planes and everything we made and built, and now all those buildings are falling down and rusting where they stand. Disgusting.

At least we still have the best produce in the country, good farms, fresh water, and the best people in the Midwest. :)