In July 1927, it was announced that the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company would build a $7 million tire factory, its first outside of Akron, on a 40 acre lot on Manchester Avenue between Alameda and Santa Fe. Just one month later, the County Board of Supervisors agreed to change the name of Manchester, east of Alameda, to Firestone Boulevard. (The Firestone name rolled over another mile and a half of Manchester, up to Central Avenue, in 1929.) Groundbreaking took place in December 1927 – Russell Firestone, son of company founder Harvey S. Firestone, dug the first shovelful of dirt – and the factory opened almost exactly one year later. (Their rival Goodrich beat them to the punch.) Firestone shut down the South Gate plant in 1980. The site has been in limbo ever since, with only one original 1927 building remaining.
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