By Casey Nolen
St. Louis (KSDK) -- Before GM, Ford and Chrysler, Dorris, Moon, and Gardner were big names in the auto industry -- and they all got their start in St. Louis around the turn of the previous century.
In 1897, St. Louis Gasoline Motor Company was the first to build a horseless carriage in St. Louis.
Two years later the first auto parts store in the country opened on Locust Avenue.
By 1920 both Ford and General Motors were making cars in St. Louis, with Chrysler pulling in to town for production in 1959.
Over the next three decades, St. Louis auto manufacturing seemed to fire on all cylinders -- employing tens of thousands of workers.
And in the mid-80's, auto plants shifted gears, and re-tooled for what many hoped would be many more years of car making.
"I think we'll have work here for a pretty good while," an auto worker at the then Ford Aerostar plant in Hazelwood told NewsChannel 5.
In 1985, the plant changed over to make the minivan and KSDK reported that, along with Gm's new plant in Wentzville, and the Chrysler assembly in Fenton, the St. Louis area had three of the most modern auto plants in the country. And Missouri was strengthening its position as the second biggest auto-making state behind Michigan.
But with mass lay-offs and plant closures over the next two decades, by 2009 only GM's Wentzville plant was still running.
KSDK
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