Old gas stations

[2jakes]

Central High girls learn the art of auto-mechanics in Washington, D.C. 1927.

 

[LizzieMaine]

No doubt avid readers of the "Motor Girls" series.

 

[2jakes]

Service Woman, Serviceman: June 1943

​

 

[dh66]

The little "like" button has made me kind of a lazy poster but I just wanted to let you know that those are some great pics you've put up lately, 2Jakes.

 

[Fading Fast]

The little "like" button has made me kind of a lazy poster but I just wanted to let you know that those are some great pics you've put up lately, 2Jakes.

+1 - they have been great fun to see.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That gal has also shown up in the Everyday Women thread in the Powder Room from time to time -- her name is Frances Hesler, she was twenty-nine years old, and she worked at an Atlantic station in Philadelphia.

I believe the car there is a 1942 Dodge.

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

That gal has also shown up in the Everyday Women thread in the Powder Room from time to time -- her name is Frances Hesler, she was twenty-nine years old, and she worked at an Atlantic station in Philadelphia.

I believe the car there is a 1942 Dodge.

And catch that "gasometer" behind her - another bit of once common but now vanished Americana.

 

[2jakes]

June 1943. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Women garage attendants at the Atlantic
Refining Company. "The hard part here was figuring out that crazy clamshell hood."
Photo by Mr. Jack Delano for Office of War Information.

 

[2jakes]

Salute to the many women who took up the workload at the service gas stations
and known as "Victory Girls”

Gas station in Calif. 1942

The end for now !

 

[LizzieMaine]

Not a few of them continued long after the war. My Aunt Edie pumped gas for years when she wasn't working on the docks, and the Mobil station at the end of my childhood street was renowned in the sixties for its female attendants.

 

[2jakes]

During World War II, some 350,000 women served in the U.S. Armed Forces, both
at home & abroad. Between 1940 and 1945, the female percentage of the U.S. workforce
increased from 27% to nearly 37%, & by 1945 nearly one out of every four married women
worked outside the home.

North American Aviation, Inglewood, Calif. October 1942 (Lib.of Congress)

The “We Can Do It!” poster was not widely seen on the U.S. home front during WW2,
it became popular in the 1980s.
It is often associated with cultural icon ...
Rosie the Riveter - World War II - HISTORY.com

 

[LizzieMaine]

Most tellingly, over 100,000 women belonged to the United Auto Workers by 1945 -- and a survey of those women taken by the UAW Education Department indicated that 80 percent of them wanted to keep those jobs after the war.

(And I'm a proud UAW member myself: card no. 96278, Local 1981.)

 

[LizzieMaine]

The survey was quite specific on those points. The women said they enjoyed the sense of independence the work gave them, they enjoyed the cameraderie of the shop floor, and they enjoyed their role in the growth of the labor movement. It's detailed in Elizabeth Hawes' 1946 study "Hurry Up Please, It's Time." Hawes was a former New York fashion designer who gave up that career to go to work in an engine factory in New Jersey in 1943, and became the director of education for the UAW. The book is the result of what she learned in that job.

 

[2jakes]

Gilmore Serve Yourself ~ First Self Serve Service Station ~ 1943

"Save 5¢”

...

 

[Fading Fast]

2jakes - great pics, thank you.

One thing I have learned is that almost everything started earlier than I thought: Air conditioning in the '20s (and maybe earlier), TV '30s not '50s, etc. So your self-service pic only surprised me a bit, but what a great pic. Also, any idea how they handled the pay thing since I doubt the pumps could be monitored electronically at a centralized location like today?

 

[2jakes]

2jakes - great pics, thank you.

One thing I have learned is that almost everything started earlier than I thought: Air conditioning in the '20s (and maybe earlier), TV '30s not '50s, etc. So your self-service pic only surprised me a bit, but what a great pic. Also, any idea how they handled the pay thing since I doubt the pumps could be monitored electronically at a centralized location like today?

Thanks Fading Fast.

Do you remember or know that there was a time when people had to get up from chair
and walk over to the television set to change channels.

Obviously, there were fewer stations, but nevertheless, that was the way it was.

My 2 ¢ tells me that this was similar before pumps were monitored electronically .
But this is pure guessing, perhaps someone can share their knowledge.

 

[Fading Fast]

Thanks Fading Fast.

Do you remember or know that there was a time when people had to get up from chair
and walk over to the television set to change channels.

Obviously, there were fewer stations, but nevertheless, that was the way it was.

My 2 ¢ tells me that this was similar before pumps were monitored electronically .
But this is pure guessing, perhaps someone can share their knowledge.

My dad thought a remote control TV was just another signpost of the collapse of civilization and a work ethic (the two were inextricably linked in his worldview). And he didn't need a remote - he had me to change channels for him.

 

[2jakes]

My dad thought a remote control TV was just another signpost of the collapse of civilization and a work ethic (the two were inextricably linked in his worldview). And he didn't need a remote - he had me to change channels for him.

Ha-ha-ha-ha...that reminds me of my Dad.

And guess who was the “rabbit-ears” antennae adjuster ?

....oh yeah !

 

[Fading Fast]

Yup, I did the rabbit ears thing, the channel changing thing, the volume thing, etc. My personal favorite was being told "don't block my view" while doing any of these things - "oh, I'm sorry, is my attending to your needs annoying you." (Something no one in my generation would ever say to his father, but the thought was there.)

 

[LizzieMaine]

2jakes - great pics, thank you.

One thing I have learned is that almost everything started earlier than I thought: Air conditioning in the '20s (and maybe earlier), TV '30s not '50s, etc. So your self-service pic only surprised me a bit, but what a great pic. Also, any idea how they handled the pay thing since I doubt the pumps could be monitored electronically at a centralized location like today?

That station, located in Los Angeles, was rather a famous one -- it was a spinoff from the drive-in restaurant idea then becoming popular in Southern California. The pump lanes were monitored by carhops on roller skates, who would collect payment from customers, making change from the coin dispensers on their belts and then rolling back to the station office to ring up the sale.

This type olf service was a sales gimmick, but not a popular or long-lasting one. Customers were afraid of the fire hazard of pumping their own fuel, and didn't like the way the smell lingered on their hands. The explosion of self-service didn't happen until the oil companies began liquidating their full-service /low-volume dealers in the '70s in favor of low-overhead/high-volume convenience store outlets.