General Motors Corporation stock certificate - 1950s

Great older GM cert with top vignette of allegorical figures representing industry, flanking the famous GM logo. Affordable automotive piece for the average collector who is seeking an upgraded piece from the modern (1980's) version. Various dates from 1951-1955 (dealers choice).

General Motors Company, commonly known as GM, is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, that designs, manufactures, markets and distributes vehicles and vehicle parts and sells financial services. General Motors produces vehicles in 37 countries under thirteen brands.  General Motors led global vehicle sales for 77 consecutive years from 1931 through 2007, longer than any other automaker, and is currently among the world's largest automakers by vehicle unit sales.

In 2009, General Motors shed several brands, closing Saturn, Pontiac and Hummer, and emerged from a government-backed Chapter 11 reorganization. In 2010, the reorganized GM made an initial public offering that was one of the world's top five largest IPOs to date and returned to profitability later that year.

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.