Old gas stations

[Fritz The Cat]

Someone sent this to me and I thought I'd share. 

http://hipspics.freewebspace.com/gas/gas.html

[Hoser]

I see E10 is not anything new in Nebraska. Hoser

[FLAVALK]

I love old gas stations. Back in the 70's we had one that sold almost everything...guns, ammo, bait, clothes, canned goods, gas and it even had a deli (I use the term loosely). We use to go in the back and make our own sandwiches   The old guy who owned it would let us charge everything and pay at the end of the month. The transactions were written on a little note pad that you signed. At the end of the month you would go "settle up" with cash. It was all on the honor system...I miss that kind of trust  

Thanks for posting

[BF]

I had a job as a gas station attendant once...back in the very early '70's.  Gas was at .33 a gallon back then. 

[old2soon]

At least I know what year most of those cars are!  Worked in a gas station pump the gas check your oil and coolant wash the windows and headlights and tail lights-all for less than .25 cents a gallon!  And we had milk bread chips and smokes available also. Had a LOT of carton sales of smokes as we were lower priced than most stores at that time. A dollar got you 3 gals of gas and a pack of Luckies or Camels.  RIDE SAFE

[wiggydotcom]

Great pics! Thanks for sharing them. Here's my bike from a couple years ago at an old station in Odell, Illinois.

[Gary]

I seem to remember gas in the mid 0.20c range in the early 70's.

I noticed signs for Registered & Beautiful Restrooms. Can't find many these days that would meet them standards. 

[Smokinjoe-VRCCDS#0005]

This one is on Clinton Highway outside of Knoxville Tennessee. For years it was neglected and falling down. Recently folks have made donation's of material , labor and money .

The Airplane Service Station, also known as the Powell Airplane, is a service station built in 1930 in the shape of an airplane. Located at 6829 Clinton Highway in Powell, an unincorporated community in Knox County, Tennessee, it is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The station was built by brothers Elmer and Henry Nickle. Their intent was to increase business by having a service station that was visually unique, both to area residents and to travelers on newly widened U.S. Highway 25. Elmer Nickle had a strong interest in airplanes, and so the station was constructed in the Fantastic architectural style in the shape of an airplane.

The structure ceased being used as a service station in the 1960s, when it became a liquor store. It has also been a produce stand, bait and tackle shop, and a used car lot. Knox Heritage and a local organization, the Airplane Filling Station Preservation Association (AFSPA), are working to preserve the structure

[BobB]

Thanks for sharing those pictures.  You gota love the '50s.  Gas stations today all look alike...

An uncle of mine owned a Sinclar station in that era.  I would help out when I visited, pumping gas and washing windshields.  I still remember attendants rushing out to service vehicles.  I would stop everyone attempting to fill up my motorcycle...

[Oss]

in the texaco pic that car is a 54 olds, my brother had one

Not a responsive car at all but ROOMY

Great pics  thanks for the trip down memory lane

[Andy Cote]

Okay here's one for you:
http://husseysgeneralstore.com/

[shortleg]

      I remember changing oil and hearing the bell go off when somebpdy would
 run over the hose and make it ring. Remember those.
               shortleg

[John Schmidt]

Wow, talk about old memories. The one near the bottom with a Bings Speed Shop sign could very well have been me and my buddies. One had a Ford Business Coupe like the one we're standing next to, and I was driving my dad's '53 Ford Mainline. As a HS kid I worked in a Conoco station three nights a week. I found out he was cheating everyone with his pumps being rigged. After a call to the local authorities he was closed down. Hated that, it was a good job. 

[BF]

I seem to remember gas in the mid 0.20c range in the early 70's.

I noticed signs for Registered & Beautiful Restrooms. Can't find many these days that would meet them standards. 

The cheapest I ever bought gas was at .24 cents a gallon in the early '70's.  That was in a gas war. 

The station I worked at was a Kayo station, and at the time it was .33 cents.  That was in Florida. 

[art]

Worked in two different gas stations as a teenager. First one was across the street from where I lived. A cheapo station. They sold bulk reclaimed oil and gas was $.16 a gallon with water included. The second one was a friend of my Dads and he hired me as an attendant and mechanic changing oil and minor tune ups. I bought my first new car while working there, a 64 1/2 Mustang. While going home from work my coworker was coming to work driving his mothers car. It was around 6 PM and dark with no street lights. He was driving without headlights and we hit head on. My new beautiful Mustang all smashed up. I felt like killing him.

[Hef]

Thanks for the great post. 

[cookiedough]

sort of interesting this topic came up since I just got done this past weekend filling up at our local mom/pop 1 pump gas station that has been in business for dozens of years in my small hometown.  The owner is about 65 years old and has been there over 35+ years he said and lives above his corner gas station.  We chatted as I paid him and he remembers the good old days as he calls it when he pumped the cars gas and cleaned windshield/tire pressure for free back in the 70's and even into the early/mid 80's, then it all stopped he said when bigtime gas stations came into the area in the 80's.   He said now that he is older and has had some recent health issues,  he wouldn't enjoy going out and pumping gas/cleaning windshields especially in the bitter cold anymore.  He does still though minor engine maintenance like oil changes and tons of tire changes/repairs, mostly farm implement tires and car tires of course.  He surely has worked hard all his life and earned his money a few cents per gallon profit at a time.  I don't foresee him doing that hard manual labor much more, say a few more years, if his health still holds good.  Nice guy,  not many of the good old guys around like that anymore owning his own business basically a one man operation no other workers besides his wife who had to fill in for him at the pump/till when he got sick in the hospital recently.  If he is not there (or his wife),  no income at all since has no employer, he is the employer and only owner.  Sometimes I think being your own boss would be well worth it. 

[G-Man]

No THAT'S cool!

[solo1]

Thanks for the great post!  I would like to own the car in the LIFE mag picture, a LaSalle.  Remember "All in the Family?"   "the LaSalle ran great"

The local gas station in my old neighborhood was the place to go for used oil, used tires and wood alcohol, all for my junk cars. Oil for oil change, tires to replace blowouts, and wood alcohol (methanol) for antifreeze.
I generally got in arguments about pumping my own gas for the motorcycles, Blue Sunoco, didn't trust the attendants.

[Bigwolf]

Now that's a trip down memory lane!  I remember most of those cars.  I worked at service stations during and after my high school years.  My days at  the stations were spent pumping gas, washing cars, changing tires, and doing whatever mechanical work was needed.

Since I worked evening most of the time, I was often the only employee there so I had to do it all.  I really hated when someone wanted a car washed in the cold weather because wet hands do not do well pumping gas in 10 degree weather. 

There were some perks though.  A certain mighty fine looking woman would sometimes ride her motorcycle up to the pump, lean back with her legs spread across the saddle and say "fill me up".  She would always look me straight in the eye and grin when she said that.     I knew her husband too.  He was a big shot businessman.   

I remember when this station was still in operation.  Now it just sits there like a museum piece all roped off.  It is downtown Kingwood, WV.  Just a block from the court house.


The people that owned it lived in the house behind.  In later years, they put a sign in the window that reads "honk your horn, we'll open".  You can see the sign in the first pic.

Thanks for the memory jog.

Bigwolf