Tweedy Factory

FYI For the West Coast Buick Guys:

In 1936, GM built a large assembly plant in South Gate. South Gate is an industrial area south of downtown Los Angeles. The GM plant's address was 2700 Tweedy Blvd., South Gate, CA 90280. GM closed the plant in April 1982. The GM plant buildings are gone today, replaced by a schools and an industrial park. The plant built all of the GM cars and trucks there, except Cadillac and La Salle. At one time, LA was the second largest producer of autos in the USA.

The former plant site is bounded by:

North: Tweedy Blvd.

South: Century Blvd. / MLK Blvd.

West: Alameda St.

East: The back of lot line of the homes on Stanford Ave.

I am not totally sure about the southern boundry limit. Good images of the former plant site can be found on Google Earth.

The plant was serviced by the Southern Pacific Railroad, which has tracks running parallel to Alameda St. During the plant's operation Southern Pacific had a switching yard there, know as the Tweedy Yard. The tracks for the switching yard have been removed. However, the tracks along Alameda St. are still in use today. The GM South Gate plant was also known as the Tweedy Plant. The Firestone Tire and Rubber Co. also had a large plant in South Gate, serviced by the Southern Pacific. The Firestone plant is still there today, but no longer owned by Firestone.

If any forum members have information, photos, or stories about GM's Tweedy Plant, please post them.

Thanks,

Grandpa

Dear Grandpa:

For additional info, the first Buicks at Southgate were 1937 models, starting with 160 cars in October 1936

Regards, Dave Corbin

I think the southern end of the plant was at Seminole. GM sold the property to the City in 1985. The buildings along the north side of Seminole were built in 1989, whereas some of the buildings immediately south of Seminole were built in 1934, which would make them older than the GM plant.

I've done research on other properties in this immediate area and there is older aerial photography out there. Try Terraserver. They may have aerial imagery that shows the plant.

Tweedy??? Don't tell me they named that street after the infamous Warner Brothers cartoon character Tweedy Bird???

Only in California. Dave!

Origin of the name for Tweedy Blvd.:

The Tweedy family was one of the original families to settle in the area. Mr. R.D. Tweedy was born in 1812 in Illinois and came to California in 1852. The family owned 2,000 acres of the land that South Gate is now built on.

Grandpa

Thanks for clearing that up Grandpa. Ya had me worried for a moment that things were loony around there.

Imagine, Toons building cars.

I guess you would have called that a "Micky Mouse operation". LOL Dave!

Dave...I'm so disappointed that you don't know it is Tweety Bird...with a t.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Dave...I'm so disappointed that you don't know it is Tweety Bird...with a t. </div></div>

Ahhh jeeesszzz. Watcha spect from a back woods redneck what lives in a one room school house and still aint got much learnin.

The teacher aint showed up fur work since 1939. Dave!

I'm not entirely convinced Easterners can be called rednecks...

Well then you aint never lived here. We had some of the finest mountian folk what have ever been reared up any place on earth.

And they all knew how to make moonshine too.

Someday I'll hafta pull out photos of some of the locals that lived in these parts when I was a young un. Dave!

Grandpa and others,

Was the Fisher Body plant that furnished car bodies for South Gate assembly located in the same factory complex? Or, as was the case with some of the assembly plants, were the car bodies trucked in from a more distant Fisher Body plant?

Many of the full-size Buicks (depending upon model) sold on the West Coast were South Gate built, well into the 1970's.

FYI For the West Coast Buick Guys:

In 1936, GM built a large assembly plant in South Gate. South Gate is an industrial area south of downtown Los Angeles. The GM plant's address was 2700 Tweedy Blvd., South Gate, CA 90280. GM closed the plant in April 1982. The GM plant buildings are gone today, replaced by a schools and an industrial park. The plant built all of the GM cars and trucks there, except Cadillac and La Salle. At one time, LA was the second largest producer of autos in the USA.

The former plant site is bounded by:

North: Tweedy Blvd.

South: Century Blvd. / MLK Blvd.

West: Alameda St.

East: The back of lot line of the homes on Stanford Ave.

I am not totally sure about the southern boundry limit. Good images of the former plant site can be found on Google Earth.

The plant was serviced by the Southern Pacific Railroad, which has tracks running parallel to Alameda St. During the plant's operation Southern Pacific had a switching yard there, know as the Tweedy Yard. The tracks for the switching yard have been removed. However, the tracks along Alameda St. are still in use today. The GM South Gate plant was also known as the Tweedy Plant. The Firestone Tire and Rubber Co. also had a large plant in South Gate, serviced by the Southern Pacific. The Firestone plant is still there today, but no longer owned by Firestone.

If any forum members have information, photos, or stories about GM's Tweedy Plant, please post them.

Thanks,

Grandpa

I just stumbled into this thread after googling for info about this plant. I used to work there in the late 70s. One correction, this plant did manufacture Cadillac's. I was also told by an old-timer back then that it manufactured tanks during WW2. Sad to see the loss of good paying manufacturing jobs...

I found a some information on the GM Tweedy plant after my 2008 post. Today, the plant is totally gone. I will share what I have - Sent me a private AACA e-mail if interested.

Grandpa

1 GM South Gate Plant Arial South.pdf

2 GM South Gate Plant Arial North.pdf

It was mentioned that the South Gate GM Assembly Plant produced Cadillacs. My research into the plant's history is that only the "Cimarron by Cadillac" was produced at the Tweedy Plant. The Cimarron was built on the GM J platform for model years 1982 through 1988. I consider the Cimarron a dressed up Chevrolet Cavalier and not a real Cadillac.

Grandpa

Grandpa--

I worked at the Southgate plant from 1977 until we were told it was going to close in 1980. At that time, we were offered jobs in another plant in Nebraska, or somewhere in the Midwest. I was in the Chassis department. I remember working on the Cadillac. I put the grills in on the front and they kept cracking.

Do you know of anyone else who worked at the plant at that time? It would be great to get together with them and talk about "old times." (and cars)

exGmer--

It was defintely sad to see all of those jobs go. It was a great paying job with good benefits. I think I would have been there at the same time you were. Is there any way to get in touch with people who would have worked at the plant? I've lost touch with people over the years, but it would nice to know if there was some kind of way to get in touch with them again.