Dodge Brothers Plant (Hastings Street and Monroe Avenue)

01 / The story of this place

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John and Horace Dodge started a small machine shop on Beaubien Street in 1900 and quickly built a reputation for precise, high-quality work, landing a major order for 3,000 transmissions from Olds Motor Works in 1902 and, the following year, a contract to supply chassis, engines, transmissions and axles for the fledgling Ford Motor Company, taking a ten percent ownership stake in Ford as part of the deal. As business grew, the brothers built a larger two-story plant at Hastings Street and Monroe Avenue in 1906, employing around 200 men and becoming, for a few years, the largest and best-equipped machine shop in Detroit. By 1910 the brothers had outgrown even that site and built a sprawling new 24-acre factory in Hamtramck, later known as Dodge Main, moving their operations there and beginning to build complete cars under their own Dodge name in 1914. The old Hastings Street corridor where the plant once stood was later cleared in the mid-20th century for construction of the Chrysler Freeway, and no trace of the original building remains.

1. Dodge brothers built engines and transmissions for Olds and Ford here starting 1900
2. Larger plant at Hastings and Monroe opened 1906, employing about 200 men
3. For a time, the largest and best-equipped machine shop in Detroit
4. Brothers moved operations to a new Hamtramck plant (Dodge Main) in 1910
5. Site later cleared for construction of the Chrysler Freeway