Where was Hudson's Proving Grounds?

[Mikeg]

Thank you for posting that article, Packman. It was informative.

The only quibble I might have was that GM's high altitude test garage was on Canon Avenue in Manitou Springs, CO. Memory says it was between the church and the back side of the Mineral Spa.

As an aside, Chrysler used to run yearly trips to the Pikes Peak area to do altitude testing. Dad was a bit envious of the fact that GM had a year round facility, but they had to work on the cars in the parking lot of the LaFon Motel.

The General Motors Pike's Peak Engineering Test Headquarters [[photo) was located at 906 Manitou Ave. in Manitou Spring, CO. [[source).

I was there in the spring of 1989 on a pilot production test drive of about one dozen 1990 "A" cars. At the time I was the chief body engineer for structure and doors and the 1990 models had a new passive seat belt system, which included a "D-ring" mounted at the upper rear corner of the door frame. About twenty of the "A" car engineers and managers flew out to the Oklahoma City plant and picked up the newly-built pilot vehicles and drove them in a caravan to Pike's Peak. However, the summit roadway beyond the Gift Shop was still closed while the road crews removed the last of the winter snowfall, so we never made it to the top. After making the first purchases of the year at the Gift Shop, we drove the pilot cars to the Engineering test facility in Manitou Springs, where they were then parked to await the arrival of another similar group of engineers who would resume the pilot production test drive up Pike's Peak and back to the Milford Proving Grounds.

As I flew out of Colorado Springs the next morning, I forgot all about the chrome-plated six-shooter I had purchased at the Gift Shop for my four year old son and which was stashed in my carry-on bag. I quickly remembered it after it went through the x-ray machine and I got asked to step behind the red velvet rope line and carry my bag to the security office!