As University of Alabama Chancellor emeritus Malcolm Portera tells it, Tuscaloosa was in a “world of hurt” in the early 1980s. The area had lost four manufacturers under the pressure of international competition for steel and the beginning of the end for cut-and-sew textile operations in the state, he said. Then came the announcement in 1983 that General Motors planned to close its Rochester Products Plant, eliminating 200 jobs. Tuscaloosa’s industrial development director at the time, Mike McCain, approached UA about the possibility of keeping Rochester Products open.