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Area GM retirees react to car maker's fall

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By Carl  Orth | The Suncoast News

Published: June 26, 2009

HUDSON - General Motors was still riding high with more than half of the American market when many Pasco retirees first went to work for the company.

They are still stunned the 100-year-old company has skidded into U.S. Bankruptcy Court.

Philip Albenze, Betty Beam and John Drielts, members of the GM Retiree Club here, reflected on where the company took a wrong turn.

They all agree there's plenty of blame to go around. But they remain loyal to "The General," a nickname for the company.

They now are witnessing the historic transformation of GM, which announced cuts of 4,000 more salaried workers this week and faces a crucial bankruptcy hearing scheduled for June 30.

The new GM may bear little resemblance to the GM they know and loved.

Albenze vividly remembers the date he was hired at GM's Lordstown, Ohio, complex on March 21, 1966, the year the plant opened.

Even today Albenze gets a big laugh out of his badge number – 007, the same as secret agent James Bond. He was the seventh man hired in the Lordstown paint department to boot.

Luck was with him indeed. He had married Luana the year before, and they celebrated their 44th anniversary June 12.

"Automobiles were my life blood," Albenze commented. He had begun painting cars at age 17. His father had owned a GM dealership in the 1940s.

Jobs were plentiful then. Albenze just naturally assumed he would spend his entire career at GM, which he did for the next 32 years. He capped his career as a salaried paint superintendent.

Betty Beam started working at GM in 1948, took a break from her career to raise a family, and then returned during a 28-year career spanning through 1989. She started in public relations and moved up to executive secretary.

"When I was there they treated me so well," Beam reflected. "We were part of the community." The company sponsored numerous Little League teams, for instance. She used to compile a newsletter.

Drielts' 35-year career at GM started as an hourly employee in tool design before he stepped up to a salaried worker in design engineering.

"I know both sides," Drielts said about unionized hourly workers and salaried employees.

"It kind of runs in the family," Drielts said about the company. He had followed in the footsteps of his dad, also named John, who worked at GM for 42 years.

The wheels fall off

GM had once ruled the American auto industry with a 53 percent market share at the time of his hiring, Albenze said.

"We were top of the line on everything," Albenze recalled.

Beam knew Roger Smith, the much-maligned chairman of GM through much of the 1980s. "We were doing great then, as far as I knew."

So what happened?

Beam rued the day when she first heard GM would begin making parts in Mexico. She wonders if that was the beginning of the end.

"The union ran the company into the ground," Drielts said, referring to the United Auto Workers.

Now the UAW is being rewarded with a majority stake in the new GM, perhaps payback for generous contributions to President Obama's campaign as a candidate, Beam speculates. Generous union contracts helped contribute to high health care costs at GM.

Countries in ruins after World War II rebuilt their auto industries and eventually overtook American car manufacturers, Albenze observed.

Car leasing loaded dealerships with scads of used cars after the leases expired, Albenze said.

Fights between union leaders and management only made things worse for GM, Albenze added. Plus GM management wouldn't listen to employees.

"Roger Smith was not the guy to be president of GM," Albenze said about a crucial juncture in GM's history. "He was a bean counter."

Loyalty endures

The local retirees will continue to drive GM cars, though.

"It's all I ever owned," Drielts said.

"I would never want to buy a foreign car," Beam said. She has driven Oldsmobiles, Chevys, Pontiacs and more. She currently gets behind the wheel of a Pontiac Grand Am, which will become an orphan once GM sheds the Pontiac brand under reorganization.

GM quality has made great progress in the past 10 to 15 years, Albenze insists. Buick recently topped a J.D. Power satisfaction survey. GM still is selling well overseas. Albenze himself tools around in a Pontiac Grand Prix.

"I'll drive a GM car until the day I die," Albenze said.

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