{"id":48158,"date":"2012-03-16T12:40:35","date_gmt":"2012-03-16T16:40:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=48158"},"modified":"2012-03-16T12:40:35","modified_gmt":"2012-03-16T16:40:35","slug":"from-watchmakers-son-to-auto-pioneer-tracing-the-roots-of-louis-chevrolet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2012\/03\/from-watchmakers-son-to-auto-pioneer-tracing-the-roots-of-louis-chevrolet\/","title":{"rendered":"From Watchmaker\u2019s Son to Auto Pioneer, Tracing the Roots of Louis Chevrolet"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
He tried his hand at making cars but the real passion for Louis Joseph Chevrolet was racing them.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Better late than never for the town of La Chaux-de-Fonds.<\/p>\n

Nestled into the snow-covered Alps, it\u2019s not a place the tourists often go, even if it is the third-largest community in the French-speaking cantons of Switzerland.\u00a0 Yet its reach is surprisingly broad.\u00a0 A disproportionate share of the town\u2019s residents tick off their days toiling in the watch industry, with eagerly-sought brands like Rolex, Omega, Movado and Girard-Perregaux headquartered here.<\/p>\n

But some of La Chaux-de-Fonds\u2019 more legendary citizens had to leave to find their fame, among them Charles-\u00c9douard Jeanneret, better known as architect Le Corbusier, and Louis Joseph Chevrolet.\u00a0 The latter, the son of a local watchmaker, was born in the Jura Mountains town in 1878 but left by the time he was 20 to pursue a career in racing and automobile manufacturing.<\/p>\n

He is, of course, the man who lent his name to the Chevrolet Motor Car Company, which the American emigrant cofounded with Billy Durant \u2013 himself the founder of General Motors, who had been forced out of GM and was looking for a way to get back into the auto industry.\u00a0 Their venture was officially registered on November 3, 1911, triggering the extensive centennial celebrations that ran most of last year.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Your Source!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And for good reason.\u00a0 After emerging from bankruptcy two years earlier, GM abandoned a number of brands, including well-known Pontiac, shifting emphasis to the marques still remaining.\u00a0 Chevrolet is playing a particular important role as the singular focus of GM\u2019s global expansion plans.\u00a0 The maker set an all-time sales record of more than 5 million vehicles last month \u2013 clicking off an additional sale \u201cevery six seconds,\u201d as Susan Docherty, president of Chevrolet of Europe is quick to point out.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Louis Chevrolet shown driving a prototype 1912 Chevrolet Series C Classic Six.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Notably, two-thirds of Chevy sales now take place outside the U.S., from Guangzhou, China to Geneva, Switzerland.\u00a0 Chevy is still a minor factor in the European market, long played down in favor of GM\u2019s Opel division.\u00a0 But with that German-based brand struggling and deep in the red, GM is putting more emphasis on Chevrolet<\/p>\n

One of the big challenges, acknowledged Docherty, during a recent conversation in Geneva, \u201cis building brand awareness.\u201d\u00a0 So, the automaker is taking Chevy back to its roots.<\/p>\n

A visit to what is often called \u201cthe Valley of Watches\u201d reveals a city not much changed since Louis Chevrolet \u2013 often pictured with a leather racing helmet, bushy handlebar mustache and broad grin \u2013 was born here.\u00a0 A UNESCO National Heritage Site, it is a town of tall but narrow homes, designed to maximize the light that came through the windows of the upper floors, where locals would carefully assemble watches in their home workshops before the era of electric lights and large factories.<\/p>\n

The well-tended Parc de l’Ouest is the centerpiece of the old part of town, a knoll of a few acres size where local residents could be seen relaxing despite the brisk air on a recent sunny winter afternoon. \u00a0A nondescript piece of artwork anchors the central mall, the sort of piece that city fathers often commission more because of a son of duty to respect the arts than because of anything special about the sculpture itself.<\/p>\n

But in the months ahead, that work will be trucked away, replaced but a more fitting piece meant to honor one of La-Chaux-de-Fonds most famous sons.\u00a0 Working with nine-member jury of local and regional politicians, historians and art experts, Chevrolet will next week reveal the finalists in an ongoing competition to honor its founder.<\/p>\n

There are already a few tributes in place, include Rue-Louis-Joseph-Chevrolet, and the wall at the local tourist board displays plaques from the annual \u201cLouis Chevrolet Event,\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 which last year attracted more than 1,000 Chevy owners to the city.<\/p>\n

But the plan is to erect a large monument at the center of what, in English, is Park West.\u00a0 Details have been kept a tight secret but four finalists will be announced next Monday.\u00a0 They\u2019re expected to range from the very literal to the abstract, but it\u2019s a good shot they\u2019ll feature the familiar Chevrolet bowtie somewhere.<\/p>\n

That logo, incidentally, was created by Durant, not Louis Chevrolet.\u00a0 The General Motors founder \u2013 who would eventually be forced out of GM again \u2013 reportedly saw the bowtie in the wallpaper of a French hotel, tore off a piece and brought it home with him, though there are several alternatives occasionally told.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s a matter of record is that Louis Chevrolet left his car company in 1915 after a falling out with Durant.\u00a0 The timing was unfortunate, as it was soon generating enough profits for Durant to buy his way back into GM.\u00a0 Chevy was merged into the automotive giant in 1917.<\/p>\n

Louis Chevrolet returned to racing \u2013 along with brothers Gaston and Arthur.\u00a0 He was a familiar face at the brickyard, racing four times in the Indianapolis 500 \u2013 albeit never doing better than a seventh-place finish in 1919.\u00a0 Brother Gaston won the Indy a year later.<\/p>\n

Louis Chevrolet\u2019s racing career didn\u2019t last much longer, nor did whatever money he was able to wring out of his entrepreneurial efforts.\u00a0 He lost just about everything in the 1929 stock market crash. And adding insult to injury, Louis Joseph Chevrolet had to take a job working on the assembly line of the company he founded.\u00a0 He died penniless on June 6, 1941.<\/p>\n

His headstone sits in a cemetery not far from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.\u00a0 But Louis Joseph Chevrolet\u2019s real monument will soon be found in his hometown of La Chaux-de-Fonds.<\/p>\n

“He didn’t live here for long, but he represented the entrepreneurship of people who lived here,” said Caroline Choulat, who oversees economic development in the community. “The town is always proud of its inhabitants”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Better late than never for the town of La Chaux-de-Fonds. The Swiss community is best known for turning out costly Swiss watches with names like Rolex and Omega, but it was also the birthplace of Louis Joseph Chevrolet. And it has some big plans coming up to honor the native son and auto pioneer, reports TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48159,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"make":[],"post-state":[],"category_old":[151],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48158"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48158"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=48158"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=48158"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=48158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}