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1928 — present · Plymouth, then 202–04 Lincoln Way East, then 666 West McKinley Avenue
The founding: The Gates house begins outside Mishawaka, and its two accounts of itself agree on the essentials. The company's own history says L. O. Gates started his first dealership in 1928 as a side business run out of his grocery store; the South Bend Tribune, writing in 2004, puts the first Gates dealership in Plymouth, Indiana, in 1928, founded by L. O. Gates. A grocer selling Chevrolets on the side in a Marshall County town is the founding form of half the dealer houses in Indiana; what distinguishes this one is that the record then follows it, canvass by canvass, for the rest of the century.
The Lincoln Way years: In the 1949 canvass the firm stands in Mishawaka as Gates L. O. Chevrolet Inc, at 202–04 Lincoln Way East, telephone 5-2151, with its used-car lot across the street at 203 Lincoln Way East; L. O. Gates is president, and the directory gives his home as 1202 East Mishawaka Avenue — the dealer lived in the city he sold in. The 1956 canvass shows the family firm whole: L. O. Gates president, Van E. Gates vice-president, Mrs. Rose I. Gates secretary-treasurer, Ned B. Gates general manager — father, mother and two sons on one letterhead. The house's documented civic course begins in these years: the Michiana Corvette Club, founded in 1957, records Gates Chevrolet of Mishawaka as its founding sponsor, a sponsorship the club's own history still carries.
The move to McKinley: Between the 1956 and 1963 canvasses Gates made the move that defines Mishawaka's dealer geography: the new-car store left Lincoln Way for 666 West McKinley Avenue, where the 1963 book lists Gates Chevrolet Inc, Van E. Gates now president-treasurer and Ned B. Gates vice-president, secretary and general manager, on the same telephone number the Lincoln Way store had carried — and the old ground was not given up: the used-car department stayed at 203 Lincoln Way East. The store's present-day address, 636 West McKinley Avenue, is the same McKinley Avenue block the 1963 canvass records, under the name Gates Chevy World. The group the Tribune described in 2004 — Gates Chevy World and Gates Town & Country in Mishawaka, Gates Toyota and an Advantage Auto used-car store on Grape Road, some 250 employees under president Larry Gates, selling in downtown South Bend since 1979 out of the vacant Sears building — grew from this store; the Town & Country store's Chrysler lineage is an open thread, carried in the Miller entry below.
The house, in one line: Founded by L. O. Gates at Plymouth in 1928 as a grocer's sideline; Mishawaka's Chevrolet store on Lincoln Way East by 1949, a four-Gates family firm by 1956; moved to McKinley Avenue by 1963 with the second generation in charge; grown by 2004 into a four-store group — and Gates Chevy World sells Chevrolets on West McKinley Avenue today, the house still in the Gates family's hands, by its own account in the third and fourth generations.
Sources:
- Polk's South Bend city directories, 1949, 1956 and 1963 (read first-hand) — the Gates L. O. Chevrolet Inc entries: 202–04 Lincoln Way E. and the 203 Lincoln Way E. used lot in 1949 and 1956, the full officer lists of both canvasses, and the 1963 entry at 666 W. McKinley Ave. with the used-car department remaining on Lincoln Way.
- Gates Automotive, the house's own history (gatesautomotive.com) — the 1928 founding as a side business from L. O. Gates's grocery store, and the family's continued ownership in the third and fourth generations; printed as the house's account.
- South Bend Tribune, 2004 (via the Mishawaka–Penn–Harris library's ProQuest summary) — the first Gates dealership established in Plymouth in 1928 by L. O. Gates; selling in downtown South Bend since 1979 from the former Sears building; the four locations of 2004, including Gates Town & Country in Mishawaka and Advantage Auto on Grape Road; about 250 employees; Larry Gates, president.
- Michiana Corvette Club, the club's own history pages — the club founded in 1957 and sponsored by Gates Chevrolet of Mishawaka.