When you read Comeback! there are a few names which pop up every now and then. Not so often you get to know them, but often enough to make you scratch your head: now who was that again? Fred Aldrich is one of those.
Aldrich was the same age as Billy Durant, and a friend from their school days. Someone as dynamic as Billy usually benefits from a steady plowhorse, able to absorb with equanimity the vicissitudes of the racehorse. Aldrich fit that description to a T. In fact, Fred Aldrich is the only person who stuck with Billy from beginning to end with all his adventures, from the buggy says to General Motors.
He was usually referred to as ‘the money man,’ because he was more than just a controller or CFO. If someone needed to carry money to the bank, Fred would do it. If Billy needed financial reports quickly, Fred made it happen.
It helped that he lived a block away from the Durant-Dort, later Buick, headquarters. Given the frenetic pace at which Billy worked, and his, shall we say, loose style of management it is fair to say chances are he would have imploded without the steady, low-key, competence Fred Aldrich brought to Billy’s management team.
When the bureaucrats took over GM, Aldrich stayed on with Dallas Dort. He was, like Dort, active in Flint and helped found the local Red Cross chapter as well as the Flint Improvement Fund.