General Motors Corporation Bonus Certificate 1920

Very rare employee certificate issued in 1920 to Larl Brahe (employee since 1919).  This certificate was normally accompanied by a letter (not available) indicating the number of GM shares awarded.  Incredible vignette of two GM vehicles and an early airplane.  Very difficult to find piece. Measures 9.5 x 12 inches.

The company was founded on September 16, 1908, in Flint, Michigan, as a holding company for McLaughlin Car Company of Canada Limited and Buick, then controlled by William C. Durant.  GM's co-founder was Charles Stewart Mott, whose carriage company was merged into Buick prior to GM's creation. Over the years Mott became the largest single stockholder in GM. GM acquired Oldsmobile later that year. In 1909, Durant brought in Cadillac, Elmore, Oakland and several others. Also in 1909, GM acquired the Reliance Motor Truck Company and the Rapid Motor Vehicle Company, the predecessors of GMC Truck. Durant lost control of GM in 1910 along with R. S. McLaughlin to a bankers' trust, because of the large amount of debt taken on in its acquisitions coupled with a collapse in new vehicle sales.

The next year, Durant started the Chevrolet Motor Car Company in 1911 in the U.S. in Canada in 1915 and through this he secretly purchased a controlling interest in GM. Durant took back control of the company after one of the most dramatic proxy wars in American business history. Durant then reorganized General Motors Company into General Motors Corporation in 1916 Merging General Motors of Canada Limited as an ally in 1918. Shortly after, he again lost control, this time for good, after the new vehicle market collapsed. Alfred P. Sloan was picked to take charge of the corporation and led it to its post-war global dominance.This unprecedented growth of GM would last into the early 1980s when it employed 349,000 workers and operated 150 assembly plants.