Filling Station

[tomturbomatic]

And over one of the bays of the Texaco station was the term Marfak lubrication. For decades, daddy was a devoted Texaco customer and believed that once you started off a car with a certain brand of oil, you never changed brands so it was always to Texaco for oil changes. I was always fascinated with the strange vessel that they hooked to the air hose to wash cars. It looked like it was made out of brass and there was that partial wall of white painted concrete blocks between the lube bay and the washing bay.

My father used to tell the guy, "Fill 'er up with high test." He called the accelerator the "foot feed" which I misunderstood as "foot feet" for years.

 

[circlew]

I personally call them "gas stations", but occasionally hear someone say "filling station".

Today I passed by one of the few full-service stations in the Cincinnati area. It's the Clark station on US 50 in Terrace Park. They also do auto repairs. It used to be a Sohio, then BP, but has been Clark for several years.

 

[petek]

We only have one full serve station in town that I know of, the old Texaco right downtown which is now a Shell. It also the only station in town that still has free air. It's mostly kids working there and they seldom ask or clean windows etc. The owners also own a car lot across the street where I bought a car. One day the owner himself is at the pumps, cleans the windows, ask if I want the oil checked and I mentioned geeze I haven't been asked that before here and he just shakes his head and laughs, I know I know. They will do it if you ask.. I buy my wiper blades there ever few months and ask them to put them on. Stopped in today and checked my tire pressures and the guy that works there was fluffing up the tires for a customer. So there's still some service. There should be it's 3 cents a liter more for regular which is almost about 10 cents a gallon over other stations.

 

[firedome]

"foot feed"

used by many former Model A drivers who grew up with a hand throttle no doubt!

Ethyl was essentially a lead additive gasoline developed to raise octane to facilitate the new higher compression engines, developed at GM by Chas. Kettering et al and spun off as The Ethyl Corporation. The term later became genericized for any "high test" like Frigidaire for any refrigerator, or Hoover for vacuum over in England, where they "Hoover the carpet".

Fun to remmeber the level of service back then, the triangular piles of brightly colored metal oil cans, the wide-whitewall tires on individual display in front of the station window, the below ground service pit inside some of the older stations (some of the oil change chains seem to have re-discoverd those). Seems like so long ago now, and I guess it was.

 

[rp2813]

Part of a Halloween Outfit

When I was acting as householder for a big 1937 home a family friend inherited back in the mid 80's, there were mountains of old hoarded stuff to go through.  I pulled a number of things that the owner didn't care about, including the cap pictured below.  I'm fairly certain it came from a long gone Union 76 station in the neighborhood.

 

I used it as the basis for a Halloween costume a couple of times, hitting thrift stores for a pair of white pants and a white shirt.  I already had the bow tie, shop rags and a pair of heavy black shoes.  Smeared everything with fake black grease, including my face, arms and hands, and I was ready to roll on up to The City for a wild champagne-fueled bash in a lavishly restored three-level Victorian.

 

I could only wear that outfit twice.  The pants got too small.  How did that happen?

 

[ovrphil]

old gas stations would be an interesting separate thread somewhere on aw.org...

look at a book of old gas stations or maybe a search on the web - so different from today's "get and go".

Fast forward 30 years and we'll have electric stations to recharge or the only fillin' will be food and drink

 

[Philip0603]

Funny That.

I still call them petrol stations, even if going for diesel. Most supermarkets call then petrol stations as well despite probably selling more diesel than petrol these days as everyone seems to run around in super economical diesels.

 

[arbilab]

Is diesel still cheaper than petrol/benzine/gas in UK? It was here but that has reversed, diesel is higher now.

McGarret on Hawaii 5-O calls them "gas stations". Or at least his scriptwriter did.

 

[rolls_rapide]

"Petrol Station" for me too

Diesel costs more per litre than petrol.

138.9 pence for petrol, where I live.
14-something-point-nine pence for diesel.

 

[davetranter]

U.K. again

'Full Service' or 'Attended Service' where an attendant pumps fuel for you is getting very rare here, except in rural areas. There is an 'Attended Service' station surviving in a rural village near to my home, it is also a repair garage. The fuel is (as expected) dearer than elsewhere, but during any fuel shortages (of which we have had a couple in the last decade or so), his regular customers are always sure of a supply, because he won't serve any 'panic buyers' who turn up.... Good for him!!

Hope this is of interest....

Dave T

 

[petek]

Gas station give-aways

Early childhood memory of when Texaco stations gave away kites every spring. That was always exciting. Esso eventually came out with their tiger tails but that wasn't a yearly event like the Texaco kites. I really remember bugging my dad for one of those tiger tails and one day he came home with one dangling out the gas cap.
I also remember the Sinclair over the river giving away inflatable Dino's which led to more pestering my dad lol.

 

[westingman123]

Give-aways

Oh, I had forgotten about those! The Shell station gave out glassware with each fill-up. Frugal Mama collected quite a set of those. Seems like Sinclair gave out paper hats, but that's a vague memory.

 

[rp2813]

Free Glasses

Oh yes, "Shell" glasses were common in our household and some of our friends'.  They were smoked glass, perhaps 12 oz size.

 

This was before we owned a dishwasher, and I remember our friends' glasses were badly etched from trips through their KDS-16.

 

[washlogic]

Hess Stations

My favorite memory as a child of the 60's was the HESS gas stations and how they used to display those white and green toy tanker truck replicas for sale on top of the pumps. I remember how they had working headlights. I wanted one in the worst way. I believe that they may be collector items today.

Anybody remember that?

 

[wayupnorth]

Promo items

I have one of the Texaco fire engines from the 60's and a Presidential coin set from Sunoco that ends with Lyndon Johnson. Besides the tiger tail and blow up Sinclair dinosaur I also had as a kid, remember the plastic horse shoes from Gulf.