olds 307 and 403

Dad told me he made 75 cents an hour surveying, and that was good money back in the late 40's. His nicest car was a 56 Ford Crown Victoria 2 door with a 312 Y block, I wish I had better pics of it. Life could no doubt be hard but was much simpler. The dissappearance of places like full service stations and nearly every retail store is scary. The people who say our society is ready to collapse may not be far off the mark.

rand5204

My older brother opened a gas station/convenience store (no service bays) on the edge of town while I was still in high school. I spent many hours there pumping gas, washing windows and checking the oil. In hindsight, there were some pretty good life lessons learned there.

Ozzie

Thanks for the memories!

Joe68hurst

At the corner of IL 22 and (Half Day Rd) and IL 43 (Waukegan Rd) in Deefield, IL is an actual Shell "Service Station". This is in a high-income area.
I don't know of any other fuel station like it in N. IL or SE WI. You can view it on Googlemaps. I don't think they do full-service fill-ups, though.

442fanatic

My grandpa ran a full service station in our small farming community in Farnhamville, Iowa up until 1989. The buried fuel tank law that went into effect that year spelled the end of it's operation. The law required all stations to dig up buried storage tanks for replacement regardless of if it leaked, to be replaced and have sample pits placed. He retired in 1979 but was still up there every day to help his son who took over the buisness until 1989. I missed out on helping and working there.
Have made many attempts over the last ten years to buy the building, but present owner has not done any maintenance to it and the near flat roofs of both bays are shot and the clay tile roof over the pumps is in bad shape...

OLDSter Ralph

I am not convinced society is ready to collapse. The "times" and technology have changed life immensely. I am sure you heard your Dad mention "the good old days" also.
"Country stores", and "Mom and Pops grocery stores" have pretty much disappeared. Same with the old "service stations".


I remember working at a service station after school til it closed at 10 PM. Repairing tires and tubes, oil and filter changes or grease job between waiting on the gas customers. $1.00/hr. was more than you could make delivering newspapers. Later, I worked in a local factory for $2.18/hr. and gas station for $1.25/hr. in the evening.
Checking the oil was a great excuse to look under the hoods of cars like GTO's, Gran Sport's, 4-4-2's, Desoto's with Firedome hemi's, 55 Chevies with 409's, 50 Olds could with 57Olds J-2, 57 Chevy with 301's and all the new cars at the time.
Life was simpler, without a doubt. You could recognize cars by the grill or tail lights from a block away. Cars were admired and people were respected.

Local Hero

My Dad and Grandfather owned a two-bay, two-pump Texaco station back when I was a kid. I used to hang out there on Saturdays since they were only open a half-day.

One pump was Regular and the other Fire Chief "High Test." Grandpa taught me how to pump gas while he would check under the hood for people. I also learned how to operate the crank air pump on the side of the building that would chime on every pound, and also how to step on the rubber hoses that were strewn across the lot to alert the guys in the service bays that a customer has pulled up in front.

Both lifts were the old school in the ground styles. One was a drive-on while the other let the wheels hangs for brake jobs and tire rotations.

We had a Pepsi machine on the front curb that dispensed ice cold glass bottles and a wooden rack next to it to place the empties.

We didn't have a Tow Truck. But instead had a 60s ****** Jeep with a huge wooden bumper on the front and a loose tire hanging in front of it for pushing dead vehicles around the place. In the winter, Dad would add a snow plow to clear the lot.

My Grandpa was supposed to be retired, yet he always would come to "work" everyday anyway. Eventually, the neighborhood became pretty rough with crime and the place had been burglarized multiple times. Dad eventually closed the place down, brought most of the equipment home to our home shop and sold the property.

It is now a vacant lot.