Manufacturing for Transportation

Manufacturing for Transportation. . , Parry Manufacturing Company (Buggies and Wagons: 1884-1905) , Overland and Parry Automobiles (1905-1917) , Martin-Parry Company (Custom Truck Bodies: 1919-1930) , General Motors Corporation (Chevrolet Truck Bodies: 1930-1022) , and the architecture of Albert Kahn, An entrepreneurial spirit seized the city at the start of the 20th century which saw the start-up and failure of nearly 70 different steam, electric, and gasoline automobile manufacturers. During those first three decades, Indianapolis was the known center for hand-crafted and high-priced automobiles such as Stutz, Duesenberg, Cole, National, and Marmon. The roots of this explosion were based on a concentrated mix of skilled labor employed in bicycle, carriage, and machinery manufacturing, of innovators and inventors, and of visionary wealthy businessmen. Parry Manufacturing Company, at 900-1300 West Henry Street, was typical of those early enterprises, shifting from a highly successful buggy and wagon manufacture to producing the Overland, Parry, and Pathfinder automobiles, offering several advanced body innovations, and going through merger, bankruptcy and receivership. Parry is also the exception, of all the facilities where automotive manufacturing occurred in Indianapolis it is the only site where automotive operations continued until 2011. In part this is due to its location next to a major east-west rail line, but perhaps as importantly it was the purchase and major reinvestment by Chevrolet in the early 1930's. The construction of the Chevrolet Motor Division Commercial Body Plant in 1934-1935 also gave Indianapolis its only built work of America's foremost industrial architect, Albert Kahn (1869-1942). An architect for modern times his career is inseparable from the rapid rise of the early 20th century automobile industry, and his international frame was propelled by his pioneering and innovative daylight motorcar factories for Packard, Pierce-Arrow, Ford, and General Motors., The new Chevy plant was in operation less than five years when war broke out in Europe. In 1941 production shifted away from consumer trucks as critical war manufacturing contracts began to be issued by the Roosevelt administration. During world war two the plant was engaged in the production of gun mounts for armored cars, bearings for Allison engines, and parts for the Pratt and Whitney aircraft engines. So successful was the production effort that the workers of this plant were awarded the Army-Navy "E" flag and the coveted lapel badges in December 1943. Thereafter, for the duration of the war, an efficiency star was added to the flag every six months. Of the huge war production efforts nationwide, only 5%, about 4,280 plants, received the "E" award, and of those the Chevy plant was the only one of 820 plants to receive more than 4 stars.