The City of Concord’s oldest business, Lehmer’s Concord Buick GMC, has been around since 1926, and today, we’ll show you a few of their historical photos.
>Lehmer’s has a huge history in Downtown Concord. In 1926, Lehmer’s began as “Golden West Service Station” on the corner of Cowell Road and Galindo.
It was started by Lewis Lehmer, who was the grandfather of Carolyn Lehmer Anderson, now the dealer of Lehmer’s Buick GMC on Willow Pass Rd. & Market St.
According to Lehmer’s, Lewis Lehmer loved working on cars, and loved fixing them up, so he had added a repair garage to the service station. When Lewis’ son Erv Lehmer graduated from Mt. Diablo High, he began traveling to San Francisco to purchase cars, and then he and his father would repair them. Buying and repairing the used cars was the beginning of their retail automobile business which has thrived for almost 90 years in Concord.
Lehmer’s Oldsmobile began next door to the service station on Cowell & Galindo, and in 1937, a three room showroom was built and they hired their first full-time mechanic.
Lehmer’s supported the community and was successful from the start.
In 1951, Erv purchased an almond orchard on Willow Pass and Galindo and built a new facility (shown below)
>The photo shown below is of the old Lehmer’s Showroom on Galindo and Willow Pass Road, at night, in 1955. This paticular photo was taken on “New Car Announcement Night”.
>These picture came from our friends at Lehmer’s Concord Buick GMC. They’re now located on the corner of Willow Pass Rd. & Market St. in Concord.
ABOUT THE CLAYCORD ONLINE MUSEUM: The Claycord Online Museum is made up of historical photos, documents & anything else that has to do with the history of our area.
If you have any old photos or items that you’d like to place in the Claycord Online Museum, just scan or take a photo of them, and send them to the following address: news@claycord.com. It doesn’t matter what it is, even if it’s just an old photo of your house, a scan of an old advertisement or an artifact that you’d like us to see, send it in and we’ll put it online!
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