Old gas stations

[LizzieMaine]

One more that I love from Shorpy: Cambridge, Vermont, 1937.

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People today tend to idealize the gas station of the Era with the advertising image of the smiling bow-tie-wearing jaunty clean-cut attendant in a sparkling art-deco station. This guy is, however, far more the reality of what the average person in an average town might have encountered when they went to buy their gas.

 

[2jakes]

Using "Preview", I reversed the image and went on the search engine for "Seaton Garage".

This came up:

Seaton garage was just before The Front on the north side of Seaton Lane, selling gasoline and also servicing cars. The photo was taken in 1962 and at some point in the 1980s, the garage was demolished and Belgrave Court housing was built on the site.

 

[1mach1]

Those fake Colonial cupolas were a huge fad in the early 70s, during the runup to the buy-centennial, and they were especially prevalent in New England, where there are more fake cupolas than real ones. Along with American/Amoco, which seemed to pioneer the trend, Sunoco went in big for the style, renovating hundreds of their oblong-box stations with fake gable roofs and a quaint little cupola with a functional weathervane on top.

Love that picture Lizzie.

 

[1mach1]

District of Columbia, 1919. Willard Service Station, Washington Battery Co., 1623 L Street.
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The sign: “We respectfully request customers to refrain from talking to workmen. Any information desired will be cheerfully given out by floor superintendent.” National Photo Company glass negative.

That first picture hangs in the Kennedy Warren condo on Connecticut Ave, along with several old DC photos. Its super cool

 

[1mach1]

Every DC-area visible-register pump has had a metal protective screen around the glass. Makes me wonder if it was some kind of local ordinance--or there were just a lot of vandals around.

It wasn't a city wide ordinance. It just depended on location and the owners decision. If it was a tougher neighborhood, they got the wire screen. Also, as Lizzie stated, it protected them from weather. However, if it was in a nicer and high dollar neighborhood, they didn't put them on.
(Thats just DC I'm referring to.)

 

[Ghostsoldier]

Rob

 

[David Conwill]

Is that the gargoyle I spy atop the Mobilgas pumps? Presumably back in 1931-'32, given the banner advertising the "NEW Ford V-TYPE EIGHT."

 

[LizzieMaine]

Yep, before the Socony-Vacuum merger, Mobiloil was widely sold and advertised at stations featuring other gasoline brands, but when the new company began pushing Mobilgas as a nationwide brand in 1934, that stopped almost instantly.

Like so many other of its old trademarks, ExxonMobil keeps the Gargoyle brand alive by slapping onto one of its more obscure industrial products: Gargoyle Arctic Refrigeration Oil.

Useless fact that will make you a popular guest at parties: there is an ocean inlet on the coast of Antarctica called "Mobiloil Bay," because the explorer that mounted the expedition sold naming rights to various formations to commercial sponsors as a way of financing his trip. Even then, the Boys never missed a trick.

 

[1mach1]

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[Fading Fast]

...Useless fact that will make you a popular guest at parties: there is an ocean inlet on the coast of Antarctica called "Mobiloil Bay," because the explorer that mounted the expedition sold naming rights to various formations to commercial sponsors as a way of financing his trip. Even then, the Boys never missed a trick.

Amazing. Did the explorer even have that right to sell that? And if so, kudos to him for creative financing. As to the Boys, fish swim, that's what they do.

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That is awesome - sated my always strong mullion-window need for the day. Bet ya there was a deafening rattle inside that structure in a strong wind.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Richfield stole the design for that type of building in toto from Shell, which developed it in 1915 as their "Type A" station. Hundreds of them went up all along the West Coast from 1915 until about 1930 or so -- they were cheap to buy and cheap to set up, and if a station failed you could take one down in an afternoon and move it someplace else. THey were a lot sturdier than they looked -- I lived down the street from a perfectly intact specimen in Santa Barbara in 1983.

As for Antarctica, it was pretty much catch-as-catch-0can fpr explorers in the 1920s, and all sorts of weird names got scattered across the map.

 

[1mach1]

Richfield stole the design for that type of building in toto from Shell, which developed it in 1915 as their "Type A" station. Hundreds of them went up all along the West Coast from 1915 until about 1930 or so -- they were cheap to buy and cheap to set up, and if a station failed you could take one down in an afternoon and move it someplace else. THey were a lot sturdier than they looked -- I lived down the street from a perfectly intact specimen in Santa Barbara in 1983.

As for Antarctica, it was pretty much catch-as-catch-0can fpr explorers in the 1920s, and all sorts of weird names got scattered across the map.

Interesting about that type of station. I have never seen one. Was that staffed by one man? It doesn't look big.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Usually just one attendant -- the inside was just big enough for a little display of packaged products and a cash register. There was , pointedly, no desk and no chair -- the attendant was not expected to spend any time sitting down.

 

[1mach1]

Usually just one attendant -- the inside was just big enough for a little display of packaged products and a cash register. There was , pointedly, no desk and no chair -- the attendant was not expected to spend any time sitting down.

That is super cool. Sad that it doesn't exist anymore. In todays world of less staff and quick service, it seems viable, if there were more pumps. And it doesn't take up much real estate. Good for a quick check over and gas on the road

 

[2jakes]

 

[2jakes]

 

[GHT]

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Oh wow, I could live there. Here's something similar on this side of the pond. In the B&W photo you can just see the original fuel pumps over the top of the truck. I love the advertising hoarding on the bus roof.

 

[vitanola]

View attachment 118357
Using "Preview", I reversed the image and went on the search engine for "Seaton Garage".

This came up:
View attachment 118358
Seaton garage was just before The Front on the north side of Seaton Lane, selling gasoline and also servicing cars. The photo was taken in 1962 and at some point in the 1980s, the garage was demolished and Belgrave Court housing was built on the site.

That's really quite funny!

For those who aren't in on the joke, the upper photo was taken on Seaton Ave. in Washington DC in 1919 or 1920. The lower photo was taken in Hartepool, Northumberland, on the North Sea Coast of Great Britain, apparently, from the car in the yard and the advertising, in the early 1960s.

 

[vitanola]

District of Columbia, 1919. Willard Service Station, Washington Battery Co., 1623 L Street.
View attachment 118340

View attachment 118342
The sign: “We respectfully request customers to refrain from talking to workmen. Any information desired will be cheerfully given out by floor superintendent.” National Photo Company glass negative.

In those early days of the electric self-starter those battery service stations were necessities. Storage batteries were expensive, and between the poorly pasted plates, fragile wood separators, and leaky tarred wood cases, batteries required a great deal of service, and more-or-less frequent rebuilding. The Willard firm, which was headquartered on Taft Ave. on the the eastern edge of Cleveland, pioneered modern construction, introducing their famous "Threaded Rubber" jars in 1913, and cases in 1915.

 

[David Conwill]

For what it's worth, this is the exterior of the Washington, D.C., Seaton Garage and Supply House back in 1919. I didn't think it was terribly remarkable, so I didn't include it originally.