Motown at 50: A history.

(From Nottingham Evening Post)

January 1959 - With an 800 loan from his family, Detroit native Berry Gordy Jr starts Tamla Records. Marv Johnson's Come To Me is the label's first release. Gordy changes the company's name to Motown Record Corporation a year later, around the same time as moving into the Hitsville USA headquarters.

JANUARY 1961 - Motown has its first No 1 hit in the R&B charts, Shop Around by The Miracles. That week, Gordy signs The Supremes, and later that year, The Temptations and Stevie Wonder join the Motown family, while The Marvelettes Please Mr Postman becomes the label's first No 1 in the pop charts.

JUNE 1962 - The fabled …