Joe Nickowski has worked at General Motors' Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly plant for 27 years and on Thursday both he and the car he built reached the end of the line.
The last Chevrolet Impala, in a bright cherry red, rolled off the Detroit-Hamtramck assembly line around 8:30 Thursday morning, and with that Nickowski and about 129 others will retire by the end of the week.
"It’s time to go," said Nickowski, 62, who's worked for GM for 43 years. "It’s time to pass the torch to these younger people to have the chance to build these great vehicles. Just like the Impala, I hate to see it go, but it’s the sign of the times.”
The plant will no longer make internal combustion engine vehicles. Instead, it will be retooled to the tune of $2.2 billion over the next 12 to 18 months for the production of all battery electric vehicles.
GM plans to build a GMC Hummer electric pickup for sale later next year and the self-driving Cruise Origin EV along with other new electric trucks at the plant. When it's at full production, GM expects to employ 2,200 people at Detroit-Hamtramck.
Until then, about 70 skilled-workers will stay on to work at the facility through the retooling process, but more than 600 general assembly workers will transfer to other GM plants with an option to return to Detroit-Hamtramck once it renovations are complete.
But 130 workers, such as Nickowski, will retire Saturday.
"Some of the guys I hired in with, they ended up coming back to this plant and I’ll be saying goodbye to them," Nickowski said. "A couple of them are retiring, too. I’ve got phone numbers and we’ll try to meet up with them now and then, have breakfast and who knows maybe go fishing or play some golf.”
But Nickowski's optimism about retirement is tempered with some sadness, too, as the conveyor belts come to a halt and production is completed.
“It’s gonna be sad, it really is," said Nickowski last week when asked about seeing the last Impala come off the line. "I put everything I could into building a quality vehicle here and at all the plants I’ve worked at. I hate to see it go."
Nickowski, who lives with his wife of 44 years in Taylor, said he's moved around a lot since hiring with GM in 1977 at its Fleetwood Cadillac Plant in Detroit. GM laid him off after only a year there and it closed the plant in 1987 after 70 years of operations.
Nickowski resumed working for GM in 1978 at the Fisher Body Plant. Then, 18 months later, he transferred to GM's Willow Run Plant near Ypsilanti before spending nine years at GM's Lake Orion Assembly. In 1993, he came to Detroit-Hamtramck.
For half of his 27 years at Detroit-Hamtramck, Nickowski was a team leader on the assembly line and has many fond memories.
"We had an exciting product with the Chevy Volt launch many years ago. I was part of the launch team then," Nickowski said. "Then the Cadillac CT6, being that it was an all-aluminum car, that was really exciting because I was a metal finisher and it was exciting to learn working with steel and working with aluminum."
GM has built such nameplates as the Oldsmobile Toronado and Trofeo, Pontiac Bonneville, Buick LeSabre, the Cadillac Eldorado, DeVille and Seville at Detroit-Hamtramck since opening the plant in 1985.
GM built the last CT6 in January. Last week, when the body for the last Impala crawled down the line, the Free Press was there to capture photos of it. Nickowski was in the paint shop.
"I took a walk back to the body shop and watched the last car go by," Nickowski told the Free Press at the time. "It’ll probably be in the paint shop some time tomorrow morning. I’ll be here to watch it go by again and this time it’ll be painted."
Seeing the last Impala roll off the line and the plant shut down, albeit temporarily, is sentimental for many workers. It means saying so long to the people they worked with for years.
More: Peculiar steel beam marks last days at GM's Detroit-Hamtramck plant
More: GM commits to $2.2 billion investment and 2,200 jobs at Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly
"I’ll miss a lot of the people. I’ve had all three of my children working here at one time," Nickowski said. "That was probably one of the best things I got to see in my working life."
His daughter now works at Flint Assembly, his son at Romulus Powertrain and his other daughter, an electrician, will work at Detroit-Hamtramck during the retooling, he said.
Nickowski said he's ready to start fishing and traveling with his wife, but there is still one itch left in him.
"I asked a couple of my managers if I can come back in a couple of years to see the production of the Hummer," Nickowski said. "They said it wouldn’t be a problem."
Contact Jamie L. LaReau at 313-222-2149 or jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and sign up for our autos newsletter.
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