Detroit

IT is fitting that the Motors Liquidation Company  that portion of General Motors that was sliced off during its bankruptcy and so is not a part of the “New G.M.” that is having its initial public offering this week  has been shortened in common parlance to “Old G.M.” “Old” is the euphemism we use when talking about a closed auto factory, and Old G.M has plenty of old plants.

Some of these plants will find buyers and be put to new uses. But many  perhaps most  will not. They’re old and unwanted, and as I’m from Detroit, where one can’t help but develop a fondness for the forgotten, I find myself thinking of Old G.M. and its old plants even as press attention turns to the new company and the initial public offering that’s supposed to help it pay off the $40 billion it still owes the government.

I understand why Old G.M. has faded to the background, but my problem with the current news foreground is this: I can’t consistently remember what I.P.O. even stands for. And, while I know that they exist, I wonder, do I.P.O.’s actually exist? How would I recognize an I.P.O. if I bumped into one?

I do know what closed auto plants look like, though, and I bump into plenty of them on my daily drives through Detroit. Depending on the day, I’ll pass by the old Continental plant, the old Budd plant, the old Packard plant and the old Fisher Body plant, among others.