Ahhh yes, the golden years of the American service station. The place where you pulled in, were greeted by someone in uniform, had your car checked out and sent off down the road with a clean bill of health. Gas stations were all about service back then because the brands that operated them demanded it. Knowing that most people thought that gasoline was gasoline, the only way to stand out in the market was to take the best care of customers. My how things have changed.
The gas station that was once artfully laid out, thoughtfully manned, and served as both an oasis on a long trip, and an forward operating post for adventure has given way to massive, bloated, monotonous, and crummy convenience stores with a hundred pumps out front.
We normally don’t get all whiney about the old days here but this was certainly a more awesome way of doing business. It employed people, it kept cars on the road, it helped people who needed it. I loved working at one of the last old school gas stations in my town. If we did not clean the windshield of the customer, the tank of gas was free. Oil? Let me check it. Mechanic question? Let me get him.
Now?
Lottery tickets, tobacco, and crummy food. Not near as cool as this.
I love this stuff. I was a very small boy when this was made, so I have very little memory of these specific cars but it is great to see them in the wild. On the film itself, I worked in a shop for many years starting in the seventies. It was not a service station but I had friends who did work at a local Shell station and the service procedures were pretty much the same. I worked in a garage affiliated with what was at the time the world largest retailer. By the seventies the company was all afire to get female personnel in the garages, even if they just \’busted\’ tires and installed batteries. When they finally got a female person to work in the garage she was there for just a few months and had had enough. The use of the terms \”men\” and \”gentleman\” is patently offensive to some in this day and age. And the idea of changing tires, batteries and oil in a white uniform is laughable. Still I love the look back at what middle America used to look like.
How the world has changed in a couple of generations! Can you imagine such inspired and attentive pump jockeys today? Heck, can you imagine having customers dressed in jacket and hat and tie? It’s almost comical. Yet, that was routine then. It’s a sad commentary on how “progress” can be regressive. I wish I had been old enough to be the customer in those days. Our world is so ugly today.
One has to wonder if that model wouldn’t work now. Are there enough people out there who would find old school service worth the extra $$$.
How many great racers and innovators got their start in a gas station? (this doesn’t work for food. Doubtful if any great cook got his/her start in a McDonalds)
Worked in a Shell station all through high school in the mid 1970’s. It was run by a father/son mechanic team who taught me everything. They would close the bays at 5pm each night. After that, I was free to put my ’55 Chevy up on the lift. You could wait a bit at the pumps if I was elbow deep in that car when you pulled up!!!…….LOL!!!
My parents had a ’56 Oldsmobile (although ours was a 4-door) like the one in the opening still. My first full time job (1968) was as a high school math teacher. On some days after school, I would stop at a Union 76 station where I knew the owner and mechanics. They were often busy so when a gas customer would pull up the pumps, I would go out to fill their car. (I taught in an affluent suburb of Minneapolis and the customers expected “full service.”) I would always wash the windshield and offer to check the oil and tire pressures. For credit cards, I would go inside, grab a charge slip (customer copy, carbon paper and the station copy), set the amount by moving four levers to 5, 8 and 0 for a charge of $5.80. The customer’s credit card name and number would make an impression on the charge slip when the roller was run back and forth across the card. I’d then take it outside for the customer to sign. It was the “good old days.” I’m 73 years old now.
I worked at an Esso station after school in 65,6,&7. We didn’t give Top Value stamps, but the Pure station across the side street did and their sign was on their corner. A lady came in one day and after I put gas in her car, I walked around to get the money & she asked for stamps. I told we didn’t give any & she said “why don’t you take your sign down?” I said that sign is at the station across the street. Go figure.
Loved the pink self-starting ’57 Chevy around 7:00; Elon Musk’s grandma? And how ’bout that two-tone Merc with the Olds Rocket motor at 14:30? HotRodPop? Sorry… I’m a little anal…